News

Global Witness calls on the US to sanction tycoons

Global Witness has called on the United States to impose sanctions against four Cambodian tycoons for their alleged roles in the demise of Cambodian democracy and for human rights abuses. Its allegations, in a report on Friday, were brushed off by a ruling CPP spokesman ...

Khuon Narim
https://www.khmertimeskh.com/50514516/global-witness-calls-on-the-us-to-sanction-tycoons/

Fight forest crimes, PM urges

Prime Minister Hun Sen declared a passion for forest protection yesterday, urging officials to improve the efficiency of forest crime prevention. ...

May Titthara
http://www.khmertimeskh.com/5079501/fight-forest-crimes-pm-urges/

How Cambodia’s record deforestation is driving crippling drought

Massive deforestation is playing a crucial role in the droughts that have devastated Cambodia. But despite an official ban on timber exports, forests continue to be cut down at a record rate.The Cambodian government awarded between 30 and 40 logging concessions to private companies during ...

Euan Black
http://sea-globe.com/deforestation-drought-cambodia/

Government responds to Global Witness

Government officials reacted strongly yesterday to a recent statement by NGO Global Witness calling on Switzerland, the host of this year’s World Economic Forum, to turn away Prime Minister Hun Sen and not give him a platform to find new international business partners. ...

May Titthara
http://www.khmertimeskh.com/news/34549/government--responds-to--global-witness/

How politics is killing Cambodia's forests

Cambodian forests, some of the most biologically diverse areas in the world, are vanishing fast as a result of the Vietnamese, Chinese and Cambodian political interests. Cambodia has one of the largest deforestation rates in the world. Forest Trends, an influential organization with a mission to conserve ...

Abu SMG Kibria
http://thediplomat.com/2016/09/how-politics-is-killing-cambodias-forests/

Government scrubs database that exposed Hun family riches

The Commerce Ministry has scrubbed its website of all corporate shareholder information since last month’s release of a report damned by Prime Minister Hun Sen’s children for shedding light on the first family’s sprawling business empire. ...

Zsombor Peter
https://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/government-scrubs-database-exposed-hun-family-riches-116772/

UN wants independent Ley investigation

A group of United Nations human rights experts have condemned the murder of Cambodian political analyst and social activist Kem Ley and called for an impartial investigation by an independent body with no ties to the government. ...

Taing Vida
http://www.khmertimeskh.com/news/27281/un-wants-independent-ley-investigation/

Inside the Hun family's business empire

Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen’s family has amassed a “vast fortune”, with stakes in at least 114 domestic companies spanning most of the Kingdom’s key sectors, including major energy, telecoms, mining and trading firms, according to an investigation by Global Witness, which accuses the Hun ...

Shaun Turton and Phak Seangly
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/inside-hun-familys-business-empire

Hun Sen orders timber sale because teachers can’t move it

Prime Minister Hun Sen on Tuesday retracted an order to use all illegally logged wood seized by the government to build schools and housing for teachers, arguing that they would struggle to carry the wood out of the forest.   ...

Kuch Naren and Aun Pheap
https://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/hun-sen-orders-timber-sale-because-teachers-cant-move-it-112430/

Timber smuggling on the rise in Cambodia's Ratanakiri province

The smuggling of illegally cut timber from northeastern Cambodia’s Ratanakiri  province to Vietnam has dramatically increased since around April 17, with smugglers traveling the roads between the two countries day and night, sources in the region say. ...

RFA Team
http://www.rfa.org/english/news/cambodia/timber-04262016170028.html

New protected forests test overstretched ministry

The nearly 1 million hectares of newly protected forests the Environment Ministry wants to create by the end of the year will add nearly a third more land to the portfolio of an agency already struggling to manage the 3.2 million hectares it has. And ...

Zsombor Peter
https://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/111001-111001/

Gov’t warns of lawsuit over new illegal logging report

Environment and agriculture ministry officials Wednesday warned the authors of a new report accusing the government of colluding with timber magnate Try Pheap to illegally log the protected forests of northeastern Cambodia that they could be sued unless they made changes to the text. ...

Aun Pheap
https://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/govt-warns-of-lawsuit-over-new-illegal-logging-report-92665/

Cambodian land grabs threaten traditional communities

Seoung Sarat survived several bloody Cambodian regimes and civil wars. But only when his country was at peace was he shot and lost a leg. The indigenous Tompuon man, now living in a borrowed home in the forest of Ratanakiri province, says he lost his right ...

Say Mony
http://bit.ly/1CszeV2

Parliamentary committee to investigate illegal logging

A parliamentary committee will look into allegations of illegal logging and timber exports, where big money and deep corruption have led to conflict, deforestation and tax fraud. Opposition lawmaker Ho Vann, who leads the National Assembly committee, told VOA Khmer he is looking into evidence and ...

Sok Khemara
http://www.voacambodia.com/content/parliamentary-committee-to-investigate-illegal-logging/2650379.html

Timber trader Try Pheap linked to logging racket

In a new report, U.K. environmental rights group Global Witness places Cambodian timber magnate Try Pheap at the heart of a vast illegal logging operation driving the country’s rarest tree species to the brink of extinction with the collusion of government and military officials. “The Cost ...

Zsombor Peter
https://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/timber-trader-try-pheap-linked-to-vast-logging-racket-77466/

Gov't audit shows Vietnam Rubber Group missing millions

Contentious plantation giant Vietnam Rubber Group reportedly “lost” nearly $391 million of state funds over five years, including $22.75 million from a rubber plantation in Cambodia, an official investigation into the firm’s dealings has found, according to Vietnamese media. Hanoi’s anti-corruption body, the General Inspectorate, last ...

Daniel Pye and May Titthara
http://phnompenhpost.com/national/govt-audit-shows-vietnam-rubber-group-missing-millions

ACU boss’s life ‘threatened’

The head of the country’s anti-graft body has said he has received two death threats since the unit responsible for directing investigations into public and private-sector corruption was established in 2010. ...

May Titthara
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/acu-boss%E2%80%99s-life-%E2%80%98threatened%E2%80%99

Rubber giant to hear villagers’ complaints

More than 15 months after a Global Witness report revealed that Vietnam’s state-owned rubber giant had illegally cleared land and displaced communities in Cambodia, the company has announced that it will accept and respond to complaints from those whose lives it has damaged. Vietnam Rubber Group, ...

Matt Blomberg
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/rubber-giant-to-hear-villagers-complaints-67074/

Rights group slams Cambodian government over land dispute death

Try Chamroeun, a 19-year-old student, was planting soybeans on Sunday along with fellow villagers on a two-hectare (half-acre) plot in Preah Vihear province, when soldier Poeun Tash demanded that he stop, claiming the land belonged to his military boss, according to London-based environmental advocacy group ...

Joshua Lipes
http://www.rfa.org/english/news/cambodia/death-07312014185132.html

HAGL called out at the UN

A Cambodian delegation to the United Nations last week used the stage to shame the World Bank’s financial arm for failing to adequately monitor investments in a Vietnamese rubber giant accused of illegal logging, forced evictions and sexual harassment. Representing 17 indigenous communities in Ratanakkiri that ...

Laignee Barron
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/hagl-called-out-un

Logging a resource issue, says official

A forestry official with the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (MAFF) who is usually tight-lipped acknowledged last week that his agency has struggled to combat illegal logging, blaming a shortage of manpower and entrenched opportunistic logging by villagers – explanations that were laughed off ...

May Titthara and Stuart White
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/logging-resource-issue-says-official

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