Minister of Agriculture Chhea Song met with Vietnamese Ambassador Nguyen Duy Hung last week to talk about closer cooperation to stop illegal logging.
Chhea Song said Monday he asked the ambassador and other Vietnamese officials to look into several timber companies that are allegedly taking logs from Cambodia.
Numerous government officials, including Mondolkiri governor Chhaom Bun Khan, have been suspended for allegedly being unable to stop 380 truckloads of logs from being taken from Mondolkiri to Vietnam last November and December.
Chhea Song said he asked the ambassador to urge timber companies not to buy unlicensed logs. He said the Vietnamese agreed to investigate. Chu Dong Loc, Vietnamese embassy spokesman, said he couldn’t disclose details of the meeting.
Cambodian officials have found 3,000 cubic meters of logs in Vietnam, about 1 km from the border, but officials have not yet determined where the logs came from, Chhea Song said.
Mondolkiri First Deputy Governor Meas Thorng and other officials also were suspended.
, the provincial director of the environmental department, police officials and others have also recently been suspended as part of the crackdown on illegal logging.
in four different areas
“I asked the Vietnamese ambassador to investigate the whereabouts of the logs exported to Vietnam and to urge timber companies not to buy any unlicensed logs,”
