Mondulkiri: On 30 January, around 4-5pm, there was a shooting at 25 km from the border guard police station Kok Orelo in Phoumham village, Sen Monorom commune, Oreang district, Mondul Kiri province.
It is reported that an army oficial, a forest ranger, and an NGO staff have been shot dead by unknown assailants. The circumstances and motive for the shooting are being investigated.


Further photos on the darknet forum.

Updated story here.

An Environment Ministry ranger, a Military Police officer and an employee of a conservation organisation have been killed in a shootout with other Cambodian authorities near Mondulkiri’s border with Vietnam.

The three were on a forestry patrol in Keo Seima Wildlife Sanctuary late this afternoon when a shootout erupted in O’Raing district. The police officer and ranger died at the scene, while an employee with Wildlife Conservation Society died en route to the hospital, officials confirmed today.

According to Provincial Governor Svay Sam Eng, there was a confrontation between the group and a “border force” stationed in the area, though it is unknown exactly why the shootout erupted.
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/b ... mondulkiri

Search on for Mondulkiri forestry patrol’s killers
1 Feburary
As authorities yesterday searched for officials suspected of killing three forestry patrollers in a brazen ambush near Mondulkiri’s border with Vietnam, families, friends and colleagues struggled to make sense of the sudden deaths of their loved ones.

Thol Khna, 26, had worked as a Geographic Information Systems staffer for Wildlife Conservation Society Cambodia (WCS) for just six months before going out on patrol Tuesday in Keo Seima Wildlife Sanctuary. He was joined that day by Military Police officer Sok Vathana and Theun Soknay, a ranger with the Environment Ministry for the sanctuary. In the late afternoon, the three were suddenly ambushed about 20 kilometres from the border in O’Raing district.

Bou Bun Chheat, the district police chief, said yesterday authorities are searching for Pheng Penh, a police officer in charge of the O’Rolear border post, and Keut Veha, the head of the armed forces’ Regiment 103. Mom Vanda, a spokesman for the Mondulkiri Provincial Court prosecutor, declined to identify the suspects, and provincial police would not comment.

“While they were patrolling, they were attacked, so they could not fight back because their group has only one gun, which was the military police officer’s,” Bun Chheat said, adding that Vathana, the only armed officer, was the first to be shot. In total, seven bullet casings from an automatic rifle were found at the scene, he said...
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/s ... ls-killers

seven bullet casings from an automatic rifle were found at the scene, he said...

police left these behind? one would think they would know better

(┛◉Д◉)┛ wrote: ↑Thu Feb 01, 2018 11:35 am

seven bullet casings from an automatic rifle were found at the scene, he said...

police left these behind? one would think they would know better

Why would they ? I doubt there is anything in a Cambodian police training manual about hiding the evidence of a shooting.

The killing has been widely reported in international media today.

Cambodian forest defenders killed after confronting illegal loggers
1 Feburary 2108
Soldiers in an area of north-eastern Cambodia where illicit logging and smuggling are rife are reported to have killed a forest protection ranger, a military police officer and a conservation worker in apparent retaliation for their seizure of equipment from illegal loggers, officials have said.

Keo Sopheak, a senior environmental official in Mondulkiri province, said the three-person team was attacked late Tuesday afternoon after patrolling in the Keo Seima wildlife conservation sanctuary. He said the dead civilian was a Cambodian employee of the New York-based Wildlife Conservation Society.

The three are the latest victims of an alarming trend in recent years, the murder of environmental defenders by parties seeking the financial exploitation of natural resources. Roughly 200 activists have been killed worldwide in each of the past two years, according to the UK-based watchdog group Global Witness.

“The three were killed not by robbers or a guerrilla group but they were shot by government armed forces who backed the illegal timber cutting,” Sopheak said. The conservation team had earlier confiscated chainsaws and motorcycles from some Vietnamese logging illegally, he said.

A copy of a report sent by Mondulkiri police chief Ouk Samnang to national police chief, Neth Savouen, identified three border security officials whom it said had shot and killed the conservation team.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... al-loggers

http://time.com/5126505/cambodia-conser ... d-logging/
https://www.usnews.com/news/world/artic ... ng-loggers

1 Feburary 2018

One of the suspects sought in the case, Keut Veha, the head of Royal Cambodian Armed Forces Regiment 103, turned himself in at the police station on Wednesday night, 31 January. However, police are still searching for suspect Phal Penh, who is a police officer in charge of the O’Rolear border post.


Further details about the incident remain unclear, though National Police spokesman Kirth Chantharith said on Tuesday night that there had been a report earlier in the day of chainsaws being confiscated by rangers, with the head of the nearby border post sent to “check on it”.
Environment Ministry spokesman Sao Sopheap simply said “those suspected are being hunted”, and that the case was being handled by competent authorities. Mom Vanda, the prosecutor at the Mondulkiri Provincial Court, said no charges will be brought until the investigation is complete.