News

Ten tons of rosewood have been uncovered under cassava roots in a raid late night Monday. The raid took place in the village of Ou Klakmom in the Song commune of the Samlot district and was made with the collaboration between park preservationists, military officers and ...

Thailand and Cambodia have agreed to intensify the suppression of the illegal logging of Phayung, or Siamese rosewood, along their border areas. Thai ambassador to Cambodia Touchayoot Pakdi said officials of the two countries have agreed to increase cooperation on the suppression of local gangs in ...

An illegal logger in Cambodia has dropped an address book during a bust, leaving behind details of corrupt government officials and spying rangers. The man fled after being intercepted by police over an illegal haul of rare rosewood in Koh Kong province earlier this month. . “We ...

Nearly three tonnes of illegally logged rosewood was seized during a raid on the home of a former military police officer in Stung Treng province yesterday. Provincial deputy prosecutor Sun Yeut, who took part in a multi-departmental raid that included police and Forestry Administration officials, said ...

Royal Thai Navy ships intercepted a Cambodian fishing boat illegally smuggling 10 million baht in Siamese rosewood out of the kingdom. The HTMS Chao Phraya staffed with military, customs and forestry office personnel captured the 18-meter-long fishing vessel carrying 296 logs in its fish holds ...

Nearly a tonne of rosewood was uncovered in a raid yesterday in Kampong Speu in which the suspect successfully fled after injuring an officer, police officials said. “According to the quality assessment, I can say a rough value of that rosewood is $300,000,” he [Keo ...

Police have cracked down on illegal large-scale rosewood smuggling at the Cambodia-Thai border in the district of Malai. In the sting operation Tuesday night, led by Banteay Meanchey prosecutor, Phan Pirom, the authorities have seized around three tons of rosewood, hidden in the truck bed used ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen has called on Thailand, Vietnam, Myanmar and Laos to help curb the illegal trade in rosewood after Cambodia’s bloodiest year yet for logging-related border shootings. Speaking to reporters at Phnom Penh International Airport after the premier returned from a two-day meeting ...

Two men were arrested yesterday and more than 1 ton of rosewood was confiscated after the car they were using to transport the illegally logged luxury wood smashed through a police barricade in Kandal province, officials said. Deputy Kandal provincial police chief Sao Sothun said that ...

A disguised shipment of nearly eight cubic metres of illegal rosewood worth an estimated $50,000 was snagged yesterday in a Forestry Administration dragnet in Siem Reap province after agents in Banteay Meanchey alerted authorities the shipment was headed their way, Forestry officials said. Siem Reap Provincial ...

Thailand and Vietnam have called for strict controls to be placed on the international trade of rosewood in an attempt to prevent the luxury wood species from be­ing logged to extinction. Cambodia currently exports thousands of cubic meters of the wood to China each year, and ...

Amid reports that a second Cambodian has been killed this year by Thai armed forces while illegally logging in Thai border territory, officials had little detail yesterday on a government directive that is aimed at ending the international demand for rosewood from Cambodia. Prime Minister Hun ...

Activists are welcoming Prime Minister Hun Sen’s public vow to prevent logging and rosewood trafficking, but they also say it’s too little too late to have any serious impact on protecting Cambodia’s already decimated forests. In a speech on Friday at the Ministry of Interior, Hun ...

Five men allegedly caught with 10 cubic meters of illegal rosewood worth more than $1 million on Wednesday were being questioned in Stung Treng provincial court yesterday, officials said. Chroeung Khmao, the provincial prosecutor, said the men – four Chinese citizens and one Cambodian – were ...

Pursat Provincial Court yesterday sentenced a military official, Poung Puthearith, to two years in jail – suspended to six months – on charges of threatening and obstructing the works of a forestry official, a court official said. Puthearith was arrested by the Anti-Corruption Unit ...

Senior members of the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces (RCAF) yesterday seized about a tonne of luxury rosewood near the house of a two-star general in the Choam Ksan district of Preah Vihear province after a night hunting for illegal smuggling. General Ngeth Chanthon, deputy general of ...

The Kompong Thom Provincial Court yesterday charged two men with illegally logging 65 pieces of rosewood, the courts director Pen Sarat, said. Provincial police said the two 19 year old men were arrested Saturday morning while transporting about 1 105 kg of rosewood in Prasat ...

Thailand and Cambodia will step up road construction, and open more checkpoints along their common borders, Thai News Agency reported on Wednesday. The resolution was made during the 8th Thai-Cambodian Joint Commission, held in Bangkok on Tuesday and Wednesday. ...

Up a sweeping jungle valley in a remote corner of Cambodia, Chinese engineers and workers are raising a 100-meter- (330-foot-) high dam over the protests of villagers and activists. Only Chinese companies are willing to tame the Tatay and other rivers of Koh Kong province, ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen has again ordered local officials to step up their efforts to stop illegal timber being cut down and transported from Cambodia’s forest’s in response to an apparent rise in forest crimes. Thousands of cubic meters of luxury wood, as well as ...

Cambodian authorities announced yesterday they would release six Laos who were arrested in Cambodia last Thursday on suspicion of illegal logging, provided that Laos cooperates with broader border negotiations in Stung Treng province’s Siam Pang district, where the men were arrested. Svay Nhoun, a Stung Treng ...

The Thai military shot dead two Cambodian soldiers from Preah Vihear province on Friday after they crossed illegally into Thai territory to log for luxury rosewood, officials said yesterday. Three soldier based in Choam Ksan district’s Sra Em commune crossed into Thailand’s Sisaketh province to search ...

The growing market for timber in China is leading to widespread logging around the world, including in Cambodia, according to a report released yesterday. The report from London-based NGO the Environmental Investigation Agency (EIA) – entitled Appetite for Destruction: China’s trade in illegal timber – outlines ...

KOH KONG, CAMBODIA — A Thai force dubbed the “Rambo Army” couldn’t stop the gangs, armed with battlefield weaponry, as they scoured the forests. Neither could a brave activist, gunned down when he came to investigate. Nor, apparently, can governments across Southeast Asia. The root of the ...