News
New Unesco heritage bid for forest site
Thailand will push ahead with another attempt to secure Unesco World Heritage site status for the Kaeng Krachan Forest Complex at the annual World Heritage Convention this month, said Varawut Silpa-archa, Minister of Natural Resources and Environment.The country’s largest national park, covering a 2.9-million rai ...
Bangkok Post Reporter
DNP surveys growing Karen population
The Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plantation (DNP) has begun verifying the number of Karen people living in the Bang Kloi community in the Kaeng Krachan National Park in Phetchaburi.The department ordered a committee to run a verification process.This comes after an unusual increase ...
Apinya Wipatayotin
Indigenous Karen villagers arrested after returning to ancestral land
87 members of the Bang Kloi indigenous Karen community, who travelled back to the location of their former village in the Kaeng Krachan forest, have been forcibly taken out of the forest and arrested by park officials, police, and military officers.The community members were taken ...
PM: Government won't use force in Bang Kloi
Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha on Tuesday said his administration won’t use force against ethnic Karen villagers living in Phetchaburi’s Kaeng Krachan National Park as past governments did.Instead, this government will take care of those living in Bang Kloi by ensuring they have proper jobs and ...
Mongkol Bangprapa
Thai parks’ protectors must recognise ethnic group's rights, experts say
Thailand must follow the example of neighbouring countries and honour the constitutional right of Karen people in Phetchaburi’s Kaeng Krachan National Park to live on what has been their ancestral land for centuries, say academics.Kittisak Prokati, a law lecturer at Thammasat University, said the Constitution ...
Pratch Rujivanarom
Brimming dams pose severe threat
People in western provinces urged to move to higher ground as more water to be released from reservoirs.Many dams in the western region are rapidly filling up due to heavy downpours, with the situation at Kaeng Krachan Dam being of the greatest concern. The reservoir ...
Pratch Rujivanarom
Thai campaigners urge change to forest law after indigenous verdict
Campaigners are calling on Thai authorities to amend a law they say violates the rights of indigenous people, after the country’s top court ruled that a group of Karen evicted from a national park had no legal right over the land.Keep reading ...
Rina Chandran
SPECIAL REPORT: A painful judgement on land rights
The top court’s recent verdict in the case of karen forest dwellers has left them without their traditional land.Shortly after the helicopter took off, those left behind could hear the bamboo stalks breaking, making a sound like the crackling of wood burning in a fire.The ...
Piyaporn Wongruang
