Logo of Phnom Penh Post newspaper Phnom Penh Post - Monk forest chief files report against soldiers

Monk forest chief files report against soldiers

The Venerable Bun Saluth, head of the Sorng Rukhavorn community forest in Oddar Meanchey. Facebook
The Venerable Bun Saluth, head of the Sorng Rukhavorn community forest in Oddar Meanchey. Facebook

Monk forest chief files report against soldiers

A community forest chief in Oddar Meanchey province is pursuing legal action against a pair of soldiers over an incident last month in which they allegedly beat and threatened forest patrollers who caught them transporting luxury timber.

The Venerable Bun Saluth, head of the Sorng Rukhavorn community forest, filed a complaint to the Forestry Administration on Friday accusing soldiers Moeng Duong and Sam Pisey of forestry crimes and threatening to set a patroller’s family on fire after patrollers stopped a mini-tractor loaded with timber.

“If they have a position they need to be demoted, because the people who committed the crime should not have a title,” Saluth said in an interview yesterday.

“They are not soldiers defending the country or protecting the people. They are thieves.”Reached yesterday, Regiment 424 Commander Sin Pean denied that his soldiers had “attacked” the patrollers.

“It actually was just pushing and not using any weapons,” Pean said.

Pean acknowledged that Duong was at fault for taking the tractor and timber back from the patrollers and fleeing. However, he denied that Duong had been logging timber himself and said he merely purchased the wood from a villager to make furniture.

Pean added that he had already educated and punished Duong “based on the regiment’s rules”, but would not elaborate further.

“We are not careless about this,” Pean said. It is illegal to transport luxury timber without a permit, regardless of its purpose, according to Cambodia’s forestry law.

The law also states that military officials who threaten Forestry Administration officers or commit forestry crimes are subject to one to five years in prison and a fine of 10 million to 100 million riel, or $2,500 to $25,000.

MOST VIEWED

  • Wing Bank opens new branch in front of Orkide The Royal along Street 2004

    Wing Bank celebrates first anniversary as commercial bank with launch of brand-new branch. One year since officially launching with a commercial banking licence, Wing Bank on March 14 launched a new branch in front of Orkide The Royal along Street 2004. The launch was presided over by

  • Girl from Stung Meanchey dump now college grad living in Australia

    After finishing her foundational studies at Trinity College and earning a Bachelor’s degree from the University of Melbourne in 2022, Ron Sophy, a girl who once lived at the Stung Meanchey garbage dump and scavenged for things to sell, is now working at a private

  • Ministry using ChatGPT AI to ‘ease workload’; Khmer version planned

    The Digital Government Committee is planning to make a Khmer language version of popular artificial intelligence (AI) technology ChatGPT available to the public in the near future, following extensive testing. On March 9, the Ministry of Post and Telecommunications revealed that it has been using the

  • Rare plant fetches high prices from Thai, Chinese

    Many types of plants found in Cambodia are used as traditional herbs to treat various diseases, such as giloy or guduchi (Tinospora cordifolia) or aromatic/sand ginger (Kaempferia galangal) or rough cocklebur (Xanthium Strumartium). There is also a plant called coral, which is rarely grown

  • Cambodia returns 15M Covid jabs to China

    Prime Minister Hun Sen said Cambodia will return 15 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines to China for donation to other countries. The vaccines in question were ordered but had not yet arrived in Cambodia. While presiding over the Ministry of Health’s annual meeting held on

  • Wat Phnom hornbills attract tourists, locals

    Thanks to the arrival of a friendly flock of great hornbills, Hour Rithy, a former aviculturist – or raiser of birds – in Kratie province turned Phnom Penh tuk tuk driver, has seen a partial return to his former profession. He has become something of a guide