After an indigenous Kraol community burned down an Environment Ministry ranger station in Kratie province earlier this month, authorities demanded on Monday that eight alleged participants travel to Phnom Penh to apologize in-person or face legal action.
Kraol representatives had rejected a previous invitation letter for a meeting at the ministry’s Phnom Penh headquarters on August 16 out of fear for their safety. But community members say they had been told last week that if they thumbprinted a public apology letter then the conflict would be resolved. Around 300 people signed.
“The Environment Ministry has not yet been satisfied, they want eight more people to apologize to the Environment Ministry at the ministry [in Phnom Penh], and that’s why we did it, to please the upper level,” said Chhear Phally, O’Krieng Senchey district governor.
Phally said that the Srae Chis villagers involved in the burning had already agreed to let the Environment Ministry return to the area and rebuild the station. One villager confirmed this, but two others declined to comment.
Villagers have told CamboJA that ministry officials harassed them, damaged property and seized farmland following recent expansions and enforcement of protected area boundaries overlapping with longstanding indigenous lands. They also expressed strong resentment and earlier this month some had warned they would not accept the station returning.
The district governor said he met with around 200 residents on Monday and promised to pay for travel costs, food and accommodation if the eight villagers went to meet with the Environment Ministry in Phnom Penh. He said they would face no arrests.
“If they still do not go, I do not know what to do,” Phally said. “They could just go to finish the conflict. The Environment Ministry just wants them to go directly, apologize, and end the conflict.”
“According to legal procedures, if they do not go to the meeting, the ministry will follow the law which will build the case and the district cannot help them,” he added.
CamboJA spoke with three of the villagers — Srem Tean, Thi Prech and Run Kimseang— all named in the Environment Ministry’s remedial apology letter and all stated they had security concerns about traveling to Phnom Penh.
“Some [villagers] agreed [to go] and some have not, so I did not know yet, let’s see,” Kimseang said. “I am scared and afraid that they will arrest me and send me to prison.”
Kratie’s Provincial Department of Environment Director Chhay Duong Savuth confirmed that he had already received last week’s apology letter from the district governor and sent it to the Environment Ministry.
New Environment Minister Eang Sophalleth could not be reached for comment and did not return CamboJA’s phone calls.
Yon Eam, human rights NGO Adhoc’s Kratie provincial coordinator, said he thought the Environment Ministry’s request for an additional, in-person apology was odd.
“I still do not understand why the Environment Ministry wants people to go to solve this conflict at the ministry,” he said. “The provincial authorities already met with people, and so why are they still called to solve it at the ministry?”
