Source: Phnom Penh Post

Villagers meet with Ministry of Mines and Energy officials at local resident Mut Mum’s home in June. Yesenia Amaro

Three residents from Kandal’s Koh Kor village have been summonsed for questioning at the provincial court for the second time in as many weeks – this time for alleged “incitement” and for allegedly damaging property belonging to a sand dredging company operating in the area.

The questioning is related to a “case of incitement leading to violence and intentional damage on . . . investment”, according to the summonses. A person identified as Van Kempha filed a complaint against the three – Mut Mum, Ly Leap and Hem Heoun, who were each summonsed last week for their protests against sand dredging in the area. Mut claimed Porniron Co Ltd was behind the complaint.

A similar name, Vann Phimpha, appears on the Ministry of Commerce’s business directory for the company. A person who picked up the phone at the company’s listed number hung up when asked about the complaint.

Mum and Leap are scheduled to appear at Kandal Provincial Court on August 24, while Heoun is scheduled to appear on August 25.

According to Mut, the company is accusing her of causing damage to their private property, which she denied. “I am preparing a lawyer and collecting some documents . . . to deal with this case, because this is a threat that simple people have never seen before,” she said.

The summonses followed the temporary detainment of an environmental activist for flying a drone without permission.

Source: Phnom Penh Post

Boeung Kak activist Tep Vanny is escorted by officials into the Supreme Court in January this year. Hong Menea

Tep Vanny stood beside four effigies on a dusky evening last August, marshalling other Boeung Kak residents to light incense sticks, hold lotus stems and throw rice at the four life-size dummies while shouting curses.

The long-time government foe was one of the few activists attempting to keep alive the civil society-initiated “Black Monday” protests – weekly peaceful demonstrations calling for the release of four human rights staffers and one election official jailed for allegedly bribing a hairdresser to deny a purported affair with a CNRP leader.

“We hope that the government will release human rights defenders, the NEC official and other prisoners of conscience,” she said at the protest, which took place one year ago today.

Minutes later, around 20 Daun Penh security guards broke up the peaceful protest, taking Vanny and fellow activist Bov Sophea into custody. A year on, the so-called Adhoc 5 have been released on bail and are back with their families. But Vanny still remains at Prey Sar’s Correctional Centre 2.

The Boeung Kak activist has been to prison before for her activism, but never for this long, and never alone. In the past, she was always surrounded by other lake activists also incarcerated at Prey Sar. This time, she said in a letter to The Post from prison, her incarceration has a different character.

“I have a clear feeling that the government will take another case to put the burden on me to stay in jail,” she said.

“This time the government has arrested me in order to silence my voice and the activities of the Boeung Kak community” once and for all, she added.

Land rights activist Tep Vanny at the ‘Black Monday’ protest where she was arrested a year ago today. Photo supplied

Her extended detention has led to an outcry among Cambodia’s NGOs and rights activists, with Boeung Kak activists yesterday submitting another petition to the UN’s Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights – the second in seven days – asking the body to push for the release of Vanny.

The submission coincides with a 10-day visit by UN Special Rapporteur Rhona Smith, who said the Appeal Court’s decision last week to uphold a 30-month sentence against Vanny – handed down in a years-old case that was suddenly resurrected – “did not meet evidentiary requirements”.

Yesterday’s petition, said Boeung Kak activist Chan Puthisak, was to remind Smith “about the anniversary of Tep Vanny’s [detention] and request her to look at the human rights situation in Cambodia and the court system”.

Sixty-four local and international civil society organisations, meanwhile, released a statement yesterday condemning Vanny’s “grossly unjust imprisonment”, and calling on the government to cease its concerted “harassment of Tep Vanny and other Boeung Kak Lake activists through arrests, prosecution and imprisonment”.

While initially taken in for organising the cursing ceremony last year – for which she and Sophea were convicted of “insulting public officials” and handed six-day prison sentences – the courts have piled on three additional, but long-dormant, cases against the Boeung Kak resident.

In the first, Vanny and three other activists – Bo Chhorvy, Heng Mom and Kong Chantha – were handed six-month sentences for a 2011 scuffle with security personnel outside City Hall. Their appeal in the case was rejected in February.

Boeung Kak community members gather to protest for activist Tep Vanny’s release outside the Appeal Court in Phnom Penh last month. Hong Menea

That same month, Vanny was slapped with the 30-month prison term upheld last week by the Appeal Court, this one for allegedly instigating violence at a protest outside Prime Minister Hun Sen’s residence in Phnom Penh in 2013.

The third case is yet to go to trial, but revolves around Vanny and five other activists allegedly threatening a former Boeung Kak resident.

Vanny and her co-accused have denied the allegations in all of the cases, and observers have called the cases political in nature, pointing out what they say are procedural and evidentiary shortcomings in the trials.

Vanny is acutely aware of the political nature of cases, as well as the charges piling up against her. In her letter, she said the government was intentionally prolonging her incarceration – and isolation, by not trying cases or enforcing sentences in cases involving other lake residents.

She said she feared her jailing would have an effect on the community’s spirit, causing them to reduce their activities, and Puthisak, the Boeung Kak activist, agreed.

The community’s energy has been depleted following Vanny’s arrest, he said, a trend he saw across other land rights communities as well.

“Not only Boeung Kak, but other communities are also facing stricter restrictions, especially when [authorities] use the judicial system on the people – it makes people scared,” he said.

A group of protesters with incense sticks during a curse ceremony outside Phnom Penh Appeal Court earlier this month. Ananth Baliga

Read more: Boeung Kak: A Disastrous Decade

While the trials of spending a year in prison have worn down Vanny – who has increasingly broken down in tears at her court appearances – it’s the separation from her two children, Ou Kong Panha and Ou Sovann Neakreach, who are now living with their grandmother, that has taken the heaviest toll.

“My life is like hell. My mother is getting old and her health is not good but she has to work as a motorbike cleaner to raise my two children,” Vanny said. “Whereas, I am living in prison as a poor divorcee.”

At Vanny’s partially completed home in the Boeung Kak resettlement area, the activist’s daughter, Kong Panha, sits outside, the spitting image of her mother.

“When she is not at home, it is difficult for me because no one takes care of me,” she said. “When [my brother] asks for our mother, I tell him that mum is about to come back to us.”

Kong Panha is too shy to say much more about her mother’s time in prison, but Vanny’s mother, Sy Heap, pleaded with the court, local officials and even Prime Minister Hun Sen to stop charging her daughter with crimes she did not commit.

“She did not commit any crime. The court should find justice for my daughter. They put her in jail for a year and that should be enough,” Heap said, wiping away her tears.

Tep Vanny’s mother Sy Heap, 68, (left) and daughter Ou Kong Panha, 13, pose for a photograph outside their home in Phnom Penh’s Daun Penh district. Sahiba Chawdhary

Vanny’s extended detention has been slammed by both local and international groups, with Human Rights Watch saying her most recent appeal trial lacked evidence or witnesses to corroborate the charges – an issue that was also echoed by Special Rapporteur Smith and local NGOs.

“We find it appalling that she is in prison for multiple charges and convictions for old cases. And every trial that has happened had no evidence and lots of procedural errors,” said Licadho’s deputy director for advocacy, Naly Pilorge.

Pilorge added there have been examples of numerous Boeung Kak representatives being arrested as groups only to emerge stronger upon their release. Vanny’s isolation this time around, she continued, could be a strategy to break her down.

“There is a question about whether or not the courts intentionally left her in prison to distance her from her family, other Boeung Kak representatives and other urban land communities,” Pilorge said. “Because she was perceived as a leader, an orator and activist, and in some instances she is the face of the Boeung Kak lake issue.”

Justice Ministry spokesmen Chin Malin and Kim Santepheap, as well as Phnom Penh Municipal Court spokesman Ly Sophanna, could not be reached for comment but have maintained in the past that the court was only following procedures.

As Vanny starts her second year in prison, she said the release of her fellow inmates, the Adhoc 5, offered her the “only hope” she has had in a while.

“And when they were released, I had another feeling that the light of justice is not too far from me,” she said. “I hope that I have freedom soon.”

“Even though I am in jail, I am handcuffed and I am wearing prison uniform, the reality is that I am forever innocent.”

Source: Phnom Penh Post

Motorists travel past the General Department of Taxation headquarters at the corner of Russian and Mao Tse-Tung boulevards in Phnom Penh in 2014. Pha Lina

At least three local NGOs have been called for questioning by the Ministry of Economy and Finance’s Taxation Department to clarify their tax payments, amid an aggressive tax collection campaign that has recently gone after media outlets the Cambodia Daily, Voice of America and Radio Free Asia.

While the government has long sought to improve its tax collection, many of those to receive calls from the Tax Department in recent days have also drawn the ire of the government in the past.

Rights NGOs Adhoc and Licadho and elections monitor Comfrel were each asked last Wednesday to appear before the department two days later. Licadho and Adhoc both asked to postpone the meeting while representatives from Comfrel did meet last week with the government. All three maintain they pay their required taxes and that this was the first time they had received such a request.

Earlier this month, Prime Minister Hun Sen instructed an investigation into whether or not NGOs in Cambodia were paying income tax for their personnel. Since the June commune elections, he has also been accusing the election monitoring coalition called the “Situation Room” – of which all three organisations are members – of operating illegally.

“It is strange [that the request came] after the Prime Minister’s speech and the recent situation with the Situation Room . . . I think this is a related issue,” said Yoeung Sotheara, Comfrel’s legal officer. “But we comply with the law, so we are not afraid.”

Just hours after Hun Sen’s speech demanding a closer look at NGO finances, a tax department letter was leaked on government-aligned media outlet Fresh News requesting the Daily pay $6.3 million in back taxes. An anonymous letter, also published on Fresh News that day, attacked Licadho, Adhoc and Comfrel, claiming they too owed taxes.

Meanwhile, US-backed radio outlets Voice of America and Radio Free Asia – long accused by the government of harbouring pro-opposition bias – also entered the spotlight this week after a Finance Ministry request to the Ministry of Information to push the media outlets to pay their taxes.

Comfrel’s Sotheara said the meeting this week seemed superfluous as it centred on questions regarding the taxes they pay for rent, which he said were not registered in the department’s system. “But it’s a mistake from the Tax Department … We pay rent and salary [taxes] together,” he said.

After the meeting, the organisation was asked to submit an audit report, an annual financial report, their bank statement, employment contracts and rental contracts. “But some reports may not be available, because they want us to go back to 2007,” when the body started paying taxes, he said.

Vann Puthipol, spokesperson of the department, defended the meetings as in line with normal tax collection. “Their duty is to pay taxes, because [everyone] is required to pay taxes,” he said, declining to comment further as he worked in a different part of the department than the one that had sent the letters.

Naly Pilorge, deputy advocacy director at Licadho, said she suspected the letters were politically motivated. “This letter comes after the Fresh News article named three local NGOs in relation to Situation Room and taxes,” she said.

She speculated that this could be a new tactic to curb NGO activities, with tax issues being used as a way “to burden and paralyse [civil society organisations] with meetings, requests for documents and other bureaucracy”.

Sami Shearman, a technical assistant to Adhoc, said her organisation would meet the department on August 22, but would likely do so without knowledge of why they were asked to appear.

Adhoc’s Ny Sokha said the organisation began paying taxes in 2015 after being granted an exemption from fines for back taxes in 2014. “The chief of the general department agreed to exempt us from being fined … so the case is clear,” he said.

He said the letter was signed by the head of the Tax Department, Kong Vibol, who could not be reached for comment.

Source: Phnom Penh Post

Sam Serei Mum, 45, looks at remains of her house that was burnt in a fire yesterday morning Meanchey district’s Boeung Tompun commune. Sreng Meng Srun

A fire tore through a village in Phnom Penh’s Boeung Tompun commune for the second time in just over a year yesterday, destroying 18 homes and displacing 24 families.

Meanchey District Deputy Governor Di Rothkhemarum said the blaze began around 6am and quickly engulfed many of the wooden houses in the district’s Tnot Chrum III village. Firemen, municipal Military Police, municipal police and residents worked for about two hours to extinguish the fire, according to officials.

“Authorities, including the experts, have not been able to determine the cause of the event yet, but in the primary step, authorities concluded that it might be caused by an electrical malfunction,” Rothkhemarum said.

No one was hurt in the blaze, which was the second to hit the village in just over a year. Last June, 34 houses in the same area were also destroyed in a fire.

Flames spread through a cluster of homes in Phnom Penh’s Boeung Tompun commune yesterday morning

Yan Sreypov, 26, who lost her home in yesterday’s fire, said she and her siblings were getting ready for work when the flames “just popped up” from a house. “I was very scared,” Sreypov said. “I tried to gather everything out of my house and I ran to help people extinguish the fire.”

Sim Sreymom, 45, whose house was also destroyed, said she first spotted the flames around 6am.

“I am not clear about the cause, but some people said that one aunty was using old wires that led to the malfunction while there were petrol cans inside the house,” she said.

Source: Phnom Penh Post

Tep Vanny’s daughter Kong Panha (left) stands with a photograph at a candlelight vigil held to protest the Boeung Kak activist’s year of detention. Pha Lina

Boueng Kak lake residents yesterday held a candlelight vigil to mark one year since fellow activist Tep Vanny was detained by law enforcement for holding a cursing ceremony at the same location.

The ceremony last year was part of a “Black Monday” protest calling for the release of the so-called “Adhoc 5”, and since her arrest then, Vanny has seen three additional cases resurrected against her, the latest one involving a 30-month sentence for allegedly instigating violence at a protest in 2013. The ruling was upheld by the Appeal Court last week.

Lake residents yesterday used candles and lotus flowers to spell out “Free Tep Vanny”, and wore homemade headbands bearing her picture as monks led the nearly 60 residents and civil society members in prayers. Large banners called for Vanny’s release from an “unjust imprisonment”.

“We demand the release of Tep Vanny,” said Bov Sophea, who was also convicted in the cursing case. “Because [the authorities] want to shut down her freedom, and only dig up old cases that happened long ago.”

Earlier in the day, activists also submitted petitions to various embassies, including the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, European Union and Japan, asking for their intervention in the case. None of the embassies responded to requests for comment.

United Nations Special Rapporteur Rhona Smith also attended the vigil and informed Boeung Kak residents that she had met Vanny at Prey Sar prison yesterday and would raise her case at the Human Rights Council in Geneva.

Source: Phnom Penh Post

Authorities say they are close to resolving a land dispute between a rubber company and villagers in Anlong Veng commune after Oddar Meanchey Provincial Governor Sar Thavy on Monday ordered stakeholders to accelerate talks.

Vong Pheak, Anlong Veng commune chief, said that after spending three hours meeting with stakeholders, Tomring Rubber Co Ltd has agreed to carve out land for families with verifiable claims to the property.

“I’m really happy, and hope that the land dispute lasting for 10 years already will be solved peacefully,” Pheak said.

Horchin Virakyuth, Anlong Veng district governor, said officials are verifying how many families are making land claims.

Duong Sina, a one-star general and the country director of the rubber company, raised suspicions that some families may be making illegitimate claims to the land.

“If the people have documents proving that they permanently live and have land there and are recognised by the government authorities, the company will cut the land for them immediately without any objection at all,” Sina said.

Adhoc coordinator Srey Naren said he is monitoring the situation.

Source: Phnom Penh Post

A soldier watches while company representatives tear down a house that villagers were building on what authorities claim is company land. Photo supplied

Three people involved in a violent confrontation over disputed land in Kampot province last week have been charged by an investigating judge and a fourth was arrested yesterday.

Journalist Chea Sytha and villagers Proeung Pran and Sok Pisey are charged with intentional acts of violence, damaging property and encroaching on public property, all stemming from the confrontation last week in which Chrey Bak residents wielding machetes, axes and slingshots destroyed several company cars and severely beat a security guard, according to Man Boreth, provincial court administration spokesman.

The three are accused of instigating the showdown after workers from First Bio-Tech Agricultural (Cambodia) Co Ltd tore down houses the villagers had begun building on disputed land.

Heng Phearak, an Adhoc investigator in the area, said authorities also arrested a fourth villager in connection with the incident. A relative who declined to give his name confirmed that the man had been arrested while walking to get food in Kampot province.

Khan Sophal, provincial prosecutor spokesman, said police are still looking for more villagers they believe to be responsible for instigating the conflict last week.

“There are still many accomplices,” Sophal said.

Source: Phnom Penh Post

A plane sits on the tarmac at the Siem Reap International Airport. Construction work on a new airport in the province could get underway next year. Photo supplied

Construction of Siem Reap’s new international airport, which is being developed by China’s state-run Yunnan Investment Holdings Ltd (YIHL), could start in early 2018.

Sinn Chanserey Vutha, spokesman of the State Secretariat of Civil Aviation, informed Post Property that while there had been no exact date set for construction to commence on the new airport he believed work would begin sometime in 2018.

He continued, “The construction might start early next year because the negotiations between the government and Yunnan, the Chinese company that is investing in the airport, have already come to terms.”

According to Vutha, the construction of the airport, which is set to span 750 hectares in Siem Reap’s Sout Nikom district, will be undertaken in three phases. About $500 million will be spent on the first and second stages which will allow medium-sized airplanes to land, while the second phase will cost $300 million.

Chhay Sivlin, president of the Cambodia Association of Travel Agents (CATA), welcomed the investment of a new airport in Siem Reap.

“This airport will surely attract more tourists than before, and will be able to welcome giant-sized planes,” she said.

“Other than this, I believe that the airport will provide job opportunities for people within the service and transportation industry due to its substantial distance from Siem Reap [city].”

Last October, the Cambodian government reached an agreement with YIHL to build the new $880 million airport to serve Siem Reap. The agreement gave YIHL and its construction and airport management subsidiaries an exclusive 55-year build, operate, transfer (BOT) concession on the new airport, replacing the exclusive agreement with Cambodia Airports, a company majority-owned by France’s Vinci Group.

Cambodia Airports has a monopoly on airports in Cambodia, operating international airports in Phnom Penh, Siem Reap and Sihanoukville under a 45-year concession dating back to 1995. The company also recently sunk $100 million into upgrading its terminals in Phnom Penh and Siem Reap.

Source: Khmer Times

United Nations Special Rapporteur Rhona Smith (right) sits across from NEC Chairman Sik Bun Hok in a meeting yesterday in Phnom Penh. Heng Chivoan

The National Election Committee (NEC) yesterday told United Nations Special Rapporteur Rhona Smith that election monitoring coalition the “Situation Room” will have to register with the Interior Ministry if it wants to deploy observers for next year’s elections – despite there being no such requirement in the NGO Law.

The special rapporteur met with NEC Chairman Sik Bun Hok yesterday as part of her 10-day visit to the Kingdom, raising the issue of the targeting of the election monitoring group following the commune elections, as well as the registration of migrant workers.

Following the meeting, NEC spokesman Hang Puthea said the electoral body’s head informed Smith that the Situation Room could continue with its monitoring of the elections as long as it followed the law.

“If they adhere to the law, the law will protect them. In short, it is good if they just follow the law,” he said.

The Situation Room’s legitimacy came into question after it assessed that the recently concluded commune elections were “not fully free and fair”, prompting Prime Minister Hun Sen to order an investigation into whether the loose collective of NGOs needed to be registered to operate.

An Interior Ministry investigation, however, only alleged that the NGO coalition had acted with a political bias, and did not go after it for not registering. The Law on Associations and NGOs allows civil society groups to pool together resources for projects, without having to register a new organisation.

Smith also said she raised concerns to the election body about migrant workers’ inability to register and vote – an issue brought up repeatedly by the opposition and civil society.

“I also asked about the Cambodian migrants and the opportunity for them to vote, but the director of NEC told that they have not lost their rights to vote,” she said.

UN Rapporteur Rhona Smith speaks to the press after meeting with the National Election Committee yesterday in Phnom Penh. Heng Chivoan

Recently, the NEC’s Bun Hok diverted blame for not registering Cambodian migrant workersto political parties, claiming the electoral body could not act outside the limits of the law.

The Cambodia National Rescue Party has since submitted legislation to the National Assembly enabling registration and voting along the Thai border and at embassies. The draft is at the Permanent Committee awaiting a decision on whether it will be forwarded to the floor.

“They can register in the country since our law does not allow NEC to create offices at the border or at an embassy,” Bun Hok said.

Yoeung Sotheara, a legal officer with election monitor Comfrel, questioned why the NEC was continuing to ask the Situation Room to register when there were no such legal requirements. Additionally, he said there was no organisational structure to the coalition, and thus requiring it to register would cause complications.

“Then will the leaders of the NGOs have to resign to join this new organisation?” he asked.

Smith said after the meeting that she also voiced concerns about the ruling party’s repeated “use of violent rhetoric” in the political sphere and “emphasised the need to avoid all forms of threatening and intimidating rhetoric in the months ahead”.

Source: Phnom Penh Post

A screenshot of the Facebook page Chaksmok Chao, which made a series of posts accusing international NGOs of colluding with the opposition party. Photo supplied

A raft of anonymous letters and articles critical of the National Democratic Institute (NDI) and other NGOs funded by the United States was published by government-aligned Fresh News over the weekend, which one NGO head described as an “avalanche” of misinformation intended to create uncertainty and confusion.

Last week, materials from NDI were leaked online from a training session it conducted for the Cambodia National Rescue Party in March, prompting government officials and Fresh News to accuse the group of political bias, of assisting the opposition to overthrow the government and of failing to register with the Ministry of Interior as an NGO.

The attacks on NDI continued over the weekend, when at least six articles were posted on Fresh News calling into question the intentions of USAID-funded NGOs, such as NDI, the National Endowment for Democracy, Freedom House and others – saying the State Department body was creating “hybrid NGOs” tasked with toeing a political agenda aligned with American foreign policy.

“Not only these, there are other NGOs who also will want to create a colour revolution and topple the government like they have successfully in other countries,” read a letter penned by an anonymous writer “Chaksmok Chao”.

CNRP members attend a workshop conducted by the National Democratic Institute earlier this year in Phnom Penh. Photo supplied

A companion video was circulated online with images of the Syrian civil war and NDI’s documents, with the narrator reading out the same text.

Another article, written by “So Kongchey”, alleged that NGOs were reporting rights violations only to further their causes or as a jumping-off point to start a political career – naming CNRP President Kem Sokha, who used to work at Cambodian Center for Human Rights. Posted last night, the same person said Cambodia would no longer be a “paradise for civil society” after the signing of the controversial Law on Associations and NGOs, which would limit their “anarchic” activities.

In recent weeks similar posts on the news site have coincided with official action taken against NGOs Comfrel, Adhoc and Licadho, which have each been summonsed for meetings with the Tax Department.

Naly Pilorge, deputy director for advocacy at rights group Licadho, said the government-aligned media outlet’s “intensifying attacks” about topics that are administrative in nature are concerning. She said it would not only result in a reassessment from civil society of their activities but could have wider implications among the public.

“This intense avalanche of articles recently may cause uncertainty and confusion among Cambodians who are shown partial or distorted information about complicated issues instead of building trust and transparency amongst the government, public and private sector, and civil society,” she said.

Source: Phnom Penh Post

Apsara Authority officials dismantle an allegedly illegally constructed house within the protected area of Siem Reap’s Angkor Archaeological Park. Photo supplied

The Apsara Authority and Siem Reap provincial officials, as of Saturday, have demolished 171 homes out of 520 set to be removed from the Angkor Archaeological Park, an Apsara official said yesterday.

Long Kosal, spokesman for the Apsara Authority – which oversees the park – said a total of 171 buildings have been pulled down since August 10, of which 140 were dismantled by officials, with the remainder voluntarily brought down by the owners.

The removal of those homes and buildings has mainly taken place in three locations, which include Prasat Bakong and Angkor Thom districts, as well as in Siem Reap town.

Apsara Authority officials dismantle an allegedly illegally constructed house within the protected area of Siem Reap’s Angkor Archaeological Park. Photo supplied

More demolitions will continue in Prasat Bakong and Puok districts, he said.

“The buildings and houses, which have been pulled down, include houses, flats for rent, huts, [stores], fences and gasoline [shops],” he said. “Until now, there are no problems or protests . . . because [the owners] understand and have cooperated with authorities.”

Officials have said most of the homes were built during the commune elections season, with contractors pushing schemes on clients.

Source: Phnom Penh Post

Felled logs found earlier this week in the protected area of Ratanakkiri’s Lumphat Wildlife Sanctuary. Photo supplied

A group of villagers and activists in Ratanakkiri’s Lumphat district are alleging that 30 to 40 hectares of protected forest have been cleared in the past month, even after a suit was filed in July against local officials accused of turning a blind eye to logging in the area. Another group of villagers, meanwhile, protested the activists over the weekend, accusing them of working on behalf of the opposition.

Thirty ethnic Tumpoun villagers said they observed mass clearing at Art Mountain, within the Lumphat Wildlife Sanctuary, on August 11. They were accompanied by Din Khanny, a provincial coordinator for human rights group Adhoc, who confirmed yesterday that a swathe of land had been cleared in the last month.

“We have inspected and found more evidence. We will file the evidence to the court before the questioning in this month or next month,” Khanny said.

In July, senior Adhoc official Pen Bonnar, nine villagers and Chheuy Odom Rasmey, the son of murdered environmental activist Chut Wutty, filed a suit against seven local officials. The suit accused the officials, including Phon Khemerin, director of the Ratanakkiri Provincial Department of Environment, of being complicit in the illegal logging trade.

“There were hundreds of logged trees in the mountain area,” said Chhom Phalla, one of the nine villagers involved with the complaint.

In May, the Environmental Investigation Agency reported that 300,000 cubic metres of illegal timber were hauled from Ratanakkiri to Vietnam illegally.

Khemerin, who has previously denied his involvement, refused to comment on the case yesterday.

According to an article on the National Police website yesterday, 119 villagers from the same commune gathered to protest against the land activists on Saturday. According to the post, the protesters said the complainants were Cambodia National Rescue Party activists who incited Adhoc to sue the local authorities.

Ang Bunthieng, Seda commune chief, confirmed the gathering took place, while Ker Channarith, the commune’s police chief and one of the defendants in the suit, said the counter-protesters have not filed a lawsuit of their own.

Phalla, one of the original complainants, said the protesters have the right to challenge the activists, but only the court can pass judgment on the case based on the evidence.

Adhoc’s Khanny added that the plaintiffs were summonsed to appear for questioning this week, but requested a delay because they don’t yet have a lawyer.

Source: Phnom Penh Post

Logs are smuggled into Vietnam via a clandestine crossing in O’Tabok, in the Virachey National Park, in February this year. EIA

The Environment Ministry has contested Vietnamese customs data suggesting the trade in illegal timber remains vast, though Cambodian authorities will not release their own export records to show how much wood is flowing to the Kingdom’s eastern neighbour.

In a recent statement, the ministry expressed “disappointment” with “NGOs” and “some media” for “distorting, exaggerating and misleading” the public about the current state of natural forests in Cambodia.

It alleged that forestry crimes and timber exports abroad were overblown in an effort to undermine the government’s efforts to protect natural resources and as part of a “political agenda”.

“Large-scale forest crime does not happen anymore in Cambodia,” it read, adding authorities had been “preventing” and “eliminating” medium- and small-scale extraction.

The statement followed the release of Vietnamese customs data compiled by US-based NGO Forest Trends showing that Vietnam had registered imports of some 313,000 cubic metres of Cambodian timber – valued at $142 million – in the first six months of 2017.

The figure, which flies in the face of a timber export ban announced in January last year, was almost on par with the total imports of Cambodian timber for 2016, according to Vietnamese customs data.

Cambodia’s own Customs and Excise Department has not released corresponding data for timber exports and officials, including Environment Minister Say Sam Al, have insisted the ban and an ensuing crackdown have been successful.

Efforts to reach and obtain records from border checkpoints and the General Department of Customs and Excise were unsuccessful.

In its response, the Environment Ministry cited figures from its General Department of Nature Preservation and Protection indicating the rate of forest loss has slowed in recent years.

According to an explanation of the statistics provided in English, the average annual rate of forest cover loss in protected areas was 0.62 percent between 2006 and 2014, but fell to 0.3 percent between 2014 and 2016.

The explanation also gives the preliminary results of a 2016 assessment of Cambodia’s total forest cover, including unprotected forests. According to the ministry, forests cover some 45 percent of the country, and from 2014 to 2016, forest cover loss was equivalent to about 0.82 of the country’s total land area each year. The figure marks a sharp drop from the 2.7 percent annual loss recorded between 2010 and 2014.

A slowdown in forest cover loss is also reflected in University of Maryland satellite data analysed by Global Forest Watch, which show Cambodia lost 18 percent less forest cover in 2015 than it did in 2014.

However, long-time anti logging activist Marcus Hardtke said the drop in figures was a result of a 2012 moratorium on economic land concessions. The huge tracts, often totalling thousands of hectares and granted inside forests, were routinely clear-felled. As their timber supplies dried up, so did forest cover loss, Hardtke said.

The targeted felling of valuable trees, in which surrounding scrub is left behind, is more difficult to detect on satellite, he continued, pointing to a report by the Environmental Investigation Agency in May detailing a “systematic” logging operation backed by Vietnamese traders over the dry season.

Hardtke said the Vietnamese customs data reinforced the EIA report, and gave an indication of “new” sources of timber by breaking down Cambodian timber imports to Vietnam by border checkpoint.

Among the three most active border gates is Vietnam’s Hoa Lu checkpoint, which connects to Cambodia’s Pi Thnou commune, in Kratie province’s Snoul district.

The checkpoint is close to a timber depot set up for the roughly 70,000 cubic metres of timber confiscated during the logging crackdown launched in January 2016.

That timber was bought at auction by a company called V-Energy, which, according to leaked documents, received permits to export just 1,300 cubic metres of wood.

However, with more than 58,000 cubic metres of timber passing through Hua Lu checkpoint alone in the first six months of the year, Hardkte questioned whether the depot and route were also being used to launder timber, and called for an increase of inspections at the site.

Reached this week, the deputy chief of the checkpoint, Sen Sorn, said he was unaware of any wood flowing past the border gate before declining to comment further.

Also among the top three Vietnamese checkpoints receiving Cambodian wood were two close to Ratanakkiri province, the site of much of the dry season logging, according to EIA.

The Le Tanh gate, connected to O’Yadav border crossing in Ratanakkiri, registered almost 150,000 cubic metres of timber from Cambodia between January and June.

The other, the Quoc Te Bo Y border gate, which registered nearly 63,000 cubic metres of Cambodian timber, isn’t even connected to the Kingdom at all. Just 3 kilometres from Cambodia’s border at the north-eastern tip of Ratanakkiri, known as the “dragon’s tail”, the gate actually borders Laos’ Attapeu province, but is linked to Ratanakkiri by road.

Forest Trends analyst Phuc Xuan To said timber transporters could be travelling through Laos for several reasons, including less stringent controls, relationships with officials at the crossing, lower official and “unofficial” costs, and perhaps the distance from the logging site.

The proximity of the area to the Virachey National Park, however, was worrying, said Hardkte, particularly in light of the border road, currently being built, which will eventually skirt the boundary and hem in the protected area.

“Field reports suggest that logs are going straight across unofficial crossings to facilities in Vietnam,” Hardtke said. “This will increase in the next dry season, and Virachey National Park will be the target of organised illegal logging once again. This border road poses a dire threat to the integrity of the park.”

Source: Phnom Penh Post

Security guards hold hands to block Koh Kong community members protesting outside the Land Management Ministry in Phnom Penh. Pha Lina

About 100 protesters clashed with Chamkarmon district security forces after blocking the street in front of the Land Management Ministry yesterday in an attempt to get the attention of its top official.

The protesters, from four villages in Koh Kong province’s Dang Paeng and Chikor Krom communes, have been locked in a long-running land dispute with the owners of Koh Kong Sugar Industry Company.

Many of them have been living in Phnom Penh’s Samaki Rainsy pagoda for months as they petition the government for help reclaiming about 60 hectares of farmland.

A scuffle ensued after security guards began to push protesters – some of them crying, nearly all of them women – off of the road yesterday morning.

Sre Ambel district land dispute community representative Num Vannary said eight protesters sustained minor injuries.

A woman cries as Koh Kong community members gather yesterday outside Land Ministry to protest against a sugar company for land grabbing. Pha Lina

Villagers were unable to meet with Land Management Minister Chea Sophara, but had an audience with the ministry’s administrative director and spokesman, Seng Lot, who promised them he would solve the dispute but said he could not give them a timeline.

“We will not leave this problem behind, but we have not made a promise of when exactly the problem will be solved,” Lot said. Vannary said she felt “hopeless” after the meeting but said she would continue to demonstrate.

“I am no longer afraid of death,” Vannary said. “If we die here, it is also good since we have lost all of the land already.”

Phav Nueng, a protester, said villagers had lost their trust in district and provincial authorities and came to Phnom Penh to seek intervention.

“I have had no land and no job for about 10 years now after the two companies grabbed my land,” Nueng said. “Farmers like us depend on the land. What can we do if they grabbed all of our land and the state does not create jobs for us?”

Koh Kong community members gather yesterday outside Land Ministry to protest against a sugar company for land grabbing. Pha Lina

Protesters said they were later stopped from marching to Hun Sen’s house. Chamkarmon District Deputy Governor Koe Samnang said that his main goal was to maintain security and avoid traffic congestion.

“I told them not to block the road since it affects other road users,” Samnang said. “They did not listen. We, the authorities, do not want problems to happen to other people.”

Soeng Senkarona, a senior investigator for rights group Adhoc, criticised authorities for allowing the dispute to drag on.

“The authorities should have a peaceful solution,” Senkarona said. “I think that they do not want to trouble the authorities, but authorities should find a proper solution for them.”

Source: Phnom Penh post

Buildings are demolished by excavators during forced evictions in Phnom Penh’s Boeung Kak community in 2010. Touch Yin Vannith

Prime Minister Hun Sen yesterday directed Phnom Penh Governor Khoung Sreng to quickly resolve land dispute claims by seven families residing in the Boeung Kak area, an order that flies counter to City Hall’s announcement in April that it had officially closed the resolution process for the decade-long dispute.

The statement was made at an annual gathering on environmental issues, with the premier responding to a question from Boeung Kak resident Hong Sok Kheng, who requested he find a solution for the seven families who have yet to be compensated for their plots of land.

“How many are left at Boeung Kak? How much land is left in Boeung Kak? If there is any left, just end it soon,” Hun Sen said in response.

Read more: Boeung Kak: A Disastrous Decade

However, lake activist Chan Puthisak said that the seven families were from Village 1, for which Sok Kheng was a representative, but that there were more than 20 families elsewhere who were yet to get land titles at the resettlement site.

“Totally, there are more than 30 families who haven’t received the land or the land titles. We hope that there is a complete solution for Boeung Kak so that we don’t have to protest,” he said.

Land rights activist Soeung Saran welcomed the move, which he said was most likely political, but noted it was a good opportunity for City Hall to end all claims once and for all, not only the seven.

Source: Phnom Penh Post

Community members gather yesterday outside the Land Management Ministry to demand government intervention to resolve a land dispute in Kampot province. Hong Menea

Villagers from two provinces gathered in front of the Land Management Ministry yesterday to seek intervention in land disputes in Kampot and Kandal, a day after villagers from Koh Kong province scuffled with police at a similar protest.

The protesters were met yesterday by Ol Sok Yuos, deputy administration director at the Ministry of Land Management, who took their petitions but said solutions will be left up to a ministry committee.

“We will check it based on technical conditions,” Sok Yuos said. “We will not take a long time. We will try our best to help them.”

Roughly 100 of the protesters were from Takhmao district’s Doeum Mean commune, where 350 families are embroiled in a long-running land dispute with a company owned by Oknha Oeng Bunhov. The company is attempting to build a satellite town on land spanning several districts in Kandal province.

Another 100 protesters from Kampot province came from Chhouk district’s Techo Apivhat commune, where 308 families are fighting with a company owned by tycoon Chan Sothea over 1,000 hectares of farmland.

That land dispute turned violent this month after villagers clashed with company workers and security forces.

Land Management Ministry spokesman Seng Lot declined to comment yesterday.

Su Sen, a villager from Kampot province’s Derm Mien commune, said that he came to Phnom Penh because local authorities had so far been unable to find a solution.

“I feel hopeless about the solution because they promised to solve it, but we do not know when they will,” Sen said.

Battambang’s O’Char Commune Chief Sin Rozeth (front) inspects an area in her commune where she is developing a drainage system. Facebook

Prominent opposition Commune Chief Sin Rozeth again found herself in the crosshairs of Battambang town officials after they asked her to stop building a drainage system in her commune, saying it was not up to standard and not in compliance with the town’s urban plan.

Rozeth received a letter on Friday asking her to stop construction on the drainage pipe in Andoung Chen village, in O’Char commune, which she had initiated because it was missing from the town’s development plan. Some 60 percent of the work had already been completed using donations for the project.

This is not Rozeth’s first run-in with local authorities. Earlier this month, she was chided by Provincial Governor Chan Sophal for erroneously offering certain public services for free and for keeping her own personal records of commune finances.

“This is completely political. They want to deter the commune chief from the [Cambodia National Rescue Party] to be unable to show their achievements in development,” she said yesterday.

Rozeth said she was only responding to the needs of her constituents, and hoped that Town Governor Sieng Emvunsy, provincial authorities and their ruling Cambodian People’s Party would not obstruct her work.

Emvunsy yesterday said that a letter had been sent to Rozeth as early as August 18 asking her to get prior permission before starting any projects, but that instead she used it to garner sympathy and ascribed political ambitions to her disobedience.

“I think this commune chief is not clean from ‘political dirt’. She is serving her political party to get support for the 2018 election so much,” he said, adding that he would send another letter today asking for clarification on her saying that the town had prevented her from building the system.

Local support for the drain was evident when Battambang lawmaker Chheang Vun held a public forum on Saturday and said he would ask the Interior Ministry to investigate her activities, only to be met with resistance to the action from locals.

“I do not know which party you are from, but I am happy that there is no more flooding. Now, I can say it is 60 percent better,” said one villager in a video of the forum posted to Facebook.

Reached yesterday, Vun would only say that he had taken up the issue because he had received a complaint about flooding in a nearby rice field.

Another Andoung Chen resident, Hass Mony, said the town should inform Rozeth if any technical changes were needed to the drain but should not hinder her work, which they fully supported.

Since taking office, several CNRP commune chiefs have experienced pushback from the CPP’s deeply entrenched members in sub-national government. In some cases, CPP councillors have refused to vacate office space and provincial authorities have moved to block CNRP-proposed development projects.

Source: Phnom Penh Post

A man reads an issue of the Cambodia Daily in Phnom Penh. The government has come under sharp international criticism for threatening to close the paper over a purported $6.3 million tax bill. Hong Menea

International condemnation for the government’s continued clampdown on NGOs and independent media organisations continued to flow in over the weekend, with Human Rights Watch (HRW) calling it an “escalating campaign of politically-motivated harassment, intimidation, and legal action”.

In recent weeks, government agencies have initiated unilateral investigations into the tax compliance of rights NGOs and independent media outlets, including the English-language newspaper the Cambodia Daily – with the latter being asked to pay a purported $6.3 million in back taxes and penalties or cease operations.

The Daily met with tax officials on Friday, but General Manager Douglas Steele declined to comment on the meeting’s outcome.

An issue of the Cambodia Daily hangs among other newspapers at a newsstand in Phnom Penh. Hong Menea

Additionally, 15 local radio stations were asked to stop operations for allegedly not adhering to clauses in their contracts requiring them to inform the Ministry of Information about who they sell their airtime to. This has disproportionately affected independent radio broadcasters Radio Free Asia, Voice of America and Voice of Democracy, and the opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party.

On Friday, Voice of Democracy released a statement saying that in addition to two stations that had stopped airing its programming last week, three others in Siem Reap, Battambang and Banteay Meanchey provinces had followed suit.

The media closures were panned by the United Nations, European Union, HRW and Reporters Without Borders, with the latter classifying the actions taken against independent media outlets as “disturbing”.

Liz Throssell, spokeswoman for the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, expressed concerns over the media closures, asking the government to respect the country’s international obligations to ensure freedom of association and expression.

National Democratic Institute representatives pose for a photograph with former opposition leader Sam Rainsy. Facebook

The media crackdown coincided with the shuttering of the US-funded pro-democracy NGO National Democratic Institute (NDI), which was ordered to close down by the Foreign Ministry for not being properly registered. It’s foreign staff were given a week to leave the country.

HRW’s Phil Robertson said that the attack on the Daily showed a shrinking tolerance for critical views.

“The list of news, human rights and democracy-promoting organizations under attack by the Cambodian government seems to grow by the minute,” Robertson said in a statement. “Hun Sen’s authoritarian rule is being chiseled in stone.”

While the US State Department and US Embassy in Phnom Penh strongly condemned the action, it was followed by more criticism from US Representative Alan Lowenthal and veteran US Senator John McCain.

“By expelling the NDI staff, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen is only demonstrating that he is afraid of open society and debate, and that he is willing to use authoritarian tactics to suppress them,” McCain said.

Government spokesman Phay Siphan, Foreign Ministry spokesman Chum Sounry and ruling Cambodian People’s Party spokesman Sok Eysan could not be reached for comment yesterday.

Source: Phnom Penh Post

A motorbike attempts to pass through a flooded street last month in Preah Sihanouk province. Photo supplied

The Ministry of Water Resources and Meteorology has warned that heavy rains will continue throughout the country for a full week, with officials in Oddar Meanchey already reporting problematic flooding.

Oddar Meanchey Provincial Hall spokesman Chea Piseth said yesterday that two people had died as a result of flooding last month. He said the water levels in the Ta Mok reservoir in Anlong Veng district are overflowing, submerging a nearby bridge.

“At this time, our officials are examining the state of the flood and calling on the people to increase their alertness to avoid accidental incidents,” Piseth said, adding that rainfall had also “damaged hundreds of hectares of crops, including some infrastructure damage”.

Piseth added that authorities were monitoring the situation as rains continued to fall, and will be on the lookout to help any victims of flooding.

The Ministry of Water Resources also warned that areas near the Mekong, Tonle Bassac and Tonle Sap rivers and Tonle Sap lake should expect flooding in the coming days. The ministry expects heavy rainfall until August 31.

Source: Phnom Penh Post

Villagers gather in an attempt to reclaim government land on which they intend to build their houses yesterday in Kandal province. Yon Sineat

In yet another clash between newly elected opposition commune officials and their largely pro-ruling party superiors, Kandal’s provincial police chief has accused the Cambodia National Rescue Party of backing villagers who officials say have illegally grabbed land in the province’s Lvea Em district.

In a message circulated on WhatsApp, Eav Chamroeun, the provincial police chief, blamed the CNRP for the dispute in Akrei Khsat commune’s eponymous village, where about 300 families have laid claim to a strip of roadside property.

“After the CNRP became the commune chief, when they won, there was village disorder and land grabbing in Akrei Khsat, in Lvea Em district,” Chamroeun wrote.

However, the CNRP commune chief, Touch Savuth, and the villagers claiming the land yesterday denied there was any opposition role in the dispute.

Construction worker Mo Chenda, among dozens of residents at the site yesterday, said the group had acted on their own and were, in fact, stopping the owner of the adjacent block from filling in a roadside canal.

Chenda said the group, who were confronted by police yesterday morning, wanted the land carved up into small blocks for residents to build on.“They should help poor villagers,” he said.

A representative of the adjacent land’s owner, however, said the villagers were trying to take state land.

Police officials speak to villagers who are suspected of building houses on government land on Sunday night in Kandal province. Photo supplied

The CNRP won an unprecedented 500 communes at the June local elections and has since seen periodic friction between its chiefs and the incumbent bureaucracy, where the ruling Cambodian People’s Party remains firmly entrenched.

Earlier this month, a Kampong Cham CNRP commune chief was threatened with legal action for building a canal that his superiors claimed had damaged a road.

Another opposition chief in Battambang was warned by authorities to stop building a drainage system because it allegedly did not comply with the town’s urban plan. Both projects had the support of residents.
Savuth, the chief of Akrei Khsat commune, yesterday dismissed the claim she was fomenting unrest.

“If they make these allegations, they should provide evidence,” she said.

Reached later in the day, Provincial Police Chief Chamroeun appeared to backpedal, maintaining that “someone was behind the villagers”, and that he was told they were “CNRP activists”.

“The Lvea Em District Hall will hold a meeting tomorrow, and if we find out who is behind the illegal land grab we will take legal action.”