Thai border officials confiscated a 4WD loaded with rosewood yesterday as it was about to cross into Cambodia’s Oddar Meanchey province. The driver escaped, though the owner has been identified as a Cambodian soldier.

Thai Chaom Sangam border officials said that they halted a Mitsubishi Montero loaded with three pieces of rosewood.

Touch Ra, head of the checkpoint’s communication office on the Cambodian side, said that the driver was at large. “The suspect escaped into Cambodia, leaving the car and three pieces of rosewood behind,” he said, and added that “the price of those pieces of rosewood is many thousands of dollars”.

He said documents in the car showed it belonged to Leng Chamroeun, 34, a resident of Anlong Veng district’s Trapieng Brey commune, in Oddar Meanchey province. Commune police said the suspect had not returned to Tuol Tbaeng village as of yesterday afternoon.

Hing Theng, commune police chief, said that Chamroeun is a military official at Brigade 40. He said he believed the soldier had logged rosewood in Thailand before, but could not remember details.