12 February 2007

MEDIA RELEASE, BRUNO MANSER FONDS, BASEL / SWITZERLAND

Malaysian police clear Penan blockade for "certified" logging

Last primary rainforests of Sarawak under immediate danger of destruction

Samling, the Malaysian logging giant, has started to log the last primary rainforests of the Malaysian state of Sarawak after the police removed a roadblock set up by the local indigenous Penan communities. This was learned from the Borneo Resource Institute BRIMAS, a local NGO based in the city of Miri.

According to BRIMAS, the Malaysian police and staff of the Samling corporation completely removed the blockade in the Upper Baram region of Sarawak on 7 February 2007. At the time of the police action, there was no resistance by the Penan as they were staying in there village for the night. By the time they returned to the blockade, it was too late for them to resist the removal as the police were all around the blockade site.

Immediately after the removal of the blockade, the Samling group started to move into the primary forest with logging tractors and bulldozers to start building a contested logging road into the native customary land of the Long Benali community. The Penan were forced to watch from the distance how the company started bulldozing their land.

Long Benali is a Penan village on the Akah river in the interior of the Baram District. Their area is one of the very few remaining virgin rainforest areas of Sarawak. The survival of the community depends very much on forest produce collected from their native customary lands.

"We are very disappointed with this development", a BRIMAS spokesman said. Despite the clearing of the blockade, it is expected that the Penan will continue their resistance against Samling in the area: "If we don't defy the loggers now, all the remaining primary forest in the Upper Baram area will be gone within two years", a Penan source said. According to a Samling map available to the Bruno Manser Fonds, the clearing of the blockade should enable the loggers to access the remote forest areas near the Penan villages of Long Sabai and Long Sait.

The blockade site is in an area certified by the Malysian Timber Certification Council MTCC for "sustainable" logging. Only recently, a high-ranking EU delegation travelled to the area, but failed to meet up with the local Penan communities who have fought against logging in their forests for more than 10 years.

For more information, contact us under:

+41 61 261 94 74

info@bmf.ch

Bruno Manser Fonds

Heuberg 25

4051 Basel / Switzerland