Last Updated on 06 May 2013 By Phak Seangly and May Titthara The Phnom Penh Post
Members of a village patrol stand with a confiscated chainsaw and logs in Prey Lang forest last week. Photograph: Photo Supplied/Phnom Penh Post
Jarai villagers in Ratanakkiri’s O’Yadav district escalated the defense of their protected land this weekend, confiscating the keys and batteries of bulldozers owned by the Vietnamese company they claim has been illegally clearing the area, community leaders said yesterday.
The move comes after a number of protests in recent weeks at two villages in the district against a firm known as Company 72 that is working in an economic land concession area granted to conglomerate Men Sarun Co, Ltd.
Rocham Kham, a member of the forest preservation community of Paknhai commune’s Lom village, said that 30 villagers were patrolling the forest on Saturday when they came across seven vehicles razing their farmland.
“We asked them to stop and they stopped, but then they started again when we left. So we took away the keys and batteries to solve that problem,” he said. “We try to protect the forest land every day or our next generations will have no land.”