Villagers in Mondulkiri Sued DU RE CE Co., Ltd for their Land Being Grabbed

On August 11, 2009 villager representatives for 188 families in Pou Les village, Dak Dam commune, O’ Rang district, Mondulkiri province came to Phnom Penh to lodge complaints against DU RE CE Co., Ltd, which was accused of grabbing their community forestland of 641.44 hectares. The complaints were sent to the Ministry of Interior and the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries in order to seek for intervention from those concerned national authorities.

In the complaints submitted to the above institutions, the representatives briefly reported the story that on May 03, 2009 DU RE CE Co., Ltd, which owned by a Korean businessman, came to the area and primarily installed a temporary camp and cleared land to make way to community forestland area in Pou Les village.

Later, on May 8, 2009 when community representatives patrolled the forest area, they accidentally encountered Kim Myung Chhul, the company representative. When the people asked him why the company cleared out the community forest, he said that they should come and meet Mr. Nov Tunnary, a deputy provincial governor, for the company had bought the plot of forestland from him. However, when the residents, accompanied by Mr. Taeus Tong, the elder in Pou Tes village, met with Mr. Nov Tunnary to clarify about that; he replied he had not known that project had infringed the community forestland.

On June 20, 2009 district governor and other concerned authorities met with community representatives to discuss and find out solution, but since then on no solution has been made. Meanwhile the company was still planting coffee trees in the location.