Volume 8, Number 8 Phnom Penh, April 13-29, 1999

Cambodia's tiger population second highest in world...

Hunter Weiler displays a tiger skin found in O Russei market.

By Phelim Kyne

A SURVEY of Cambodia's wild tiger population indicates that there are more than triple the number of the wild cats in the Kingdom than originally estimated.

The Cat Action Treasury (CAT), an American NGO which promotes wild cat conservation projects in developing countries, has granted the Post an exclusive glimpse of a preliminary report that sets Camb-odia's tiger population at "about 700 adult tigers", far higher than previous estimates of 100-200 tigers.

The new CAT estimate places Cambodia's tiger population on a par with that of Malaysia, and second only to India's estimated 4000 tigers.

The CAT report, the brainchild of CAT Director Kristin Nowell, was based on a survey of 13 provinces between January and March of 1998, and describes the upwardly-revised estimate as "a reasonable and conservative approximation, probably on the low side."

Hunter Weiler, the coordinator of CAT's Cambodian Tiger Preservation Project, concedes the CAT report's findings will be "controversial". According to Weiler, some international wildlife NGOs have already expressed doubts about the CAT survey's methodology, which involved intensive interviews with 156 provincial government officials and 150 hunters.

"Some [international wildlife] NGOs have objected to [CAT's] use of hunter interviews to gather the data," Weiler says. He dismisses such objections as unreasonable. "Hunters are the ones who are out in the forest and really know what's happening there," Weiler says in defense of the survey methodology.

The preliminary results of the CAT survey have already prompted Exxon's "Save the Tiger Fund" to contribute US$60,000 to allow Weiler, in conjunction with the Wildlife Protection Office of the Department of Forestry and Wildlife, to conduct a series of tiger conservation workshops in the six provinces with the highest reported tiger populations.

Weiler, who completed the last of the workshops in Pursat province last week, says the workshops were designed "to get the top officials of each province together in one place to share ideas on tiger conservation".

In spite of the threat posed by ongoing illegal hunting and logging, he is optimistic that Cambo-dia's geographical and human settlement patterns give the Kingdom a unique advantage in preserving its tigers from extinction.

"In Cambodia, the forest areas where tigers live are large and not fragmented," Weiler explains. "In India tigers live only in little patches of forest scattered around the country."

Weiler advocates wildlife conservation education and a "partnership approach" with Cambodian hunters as the key ingredients to successfully controlling the lucrative trade in tiger parts that threaten the tiger's survival.

"Cambodians have hunted in the forests for centuries," Weiler says. "I'm convinced the majority of hunters aren't evil people, they're just doing what they've always done and aren't aware of the consequences."

Weiler's call for intensive grass-roots wildlife conservation educa- tion as opposed to punitive sanctions against hunters was enthusiastically endorsed by participants of the Preah Vihear workshop.

"Cambodians need to be taught about wildlife conservation the same way we had to be taught about democracy," a government official at the Preah Vihear workshop said. "When UNTAC came to Cambodia, they told us what an election was, how it was done and why it was important.

"We have to approach wildlife conservation the same way."

... but for how long?

By Phelim Kyne

MILITARY and police units in the remote northern province of Preah Vihear stand accused of trafficking in endangered wildlife parts.

This was the message conveyed to participants of a tiger conservation workshop in the Preah Vihear provincial capital of T'beng Meanchey on March 29.

Provincial forestry officer Kong Bun Houn reported to the assembled group of provincial government, military and police officials that military and economic police had been hired by wildlife traders to provide safe escort for the skins and bones of three tigers shot on March 21 in Chom Khsan district.

"A group of military and economic police took the bones from Preah Vihear in the back of a military truck, hidden under automatic weapons and mines," said Bun Houn.

Houn had been alerted to the illegal transaction by a rival wildlife trader and then confirmed the story by locating the hunter who had shot the tigers. The high prices commanded by tiger parts is suspected to be the main factor behind the police involvement in the illegal wildlife trade.

According to Houn, the hunter who shot the tigers claimed to have been paid US$185 per kilogram for the bones of the three tigers, which weighed in at 11.5, 12 and 13 kilograms respectively.

Provincial military and police officials present at the workshop made no effort to deny Houn's charges, but were quick to distance their own subordinates from responsibility.

Sim Souy, Military Police Chief for Preah Vihear, insisted that it was impossible than any of his officers could have been involved in the matter.

"The days when the bones were supposed to have been taken to Phnom Penh, all of my men were confined to base for special training," Souy explained. "Only three of my officers were outside the base and they were manning roadblocks."

Souy openly voiced his suspicions that military police units from outside Preah Vihear had been responsible for the crime. "The military police who did this may have come from Kampong Thom," he said.

Preah Vihear military commander Som Heanly expressed doubt whether the tiger bone transference had involved military police at all, instead pointing the finger of guilt at members of the roving Second Regiment.

"Second Regiment soldiers are separate from provincial military units and can travel freely between provinces," Heanly explained.

Him Sarin, Vice-director of the Wildlife and Forestry Office in Preah Vihear, alleged that military police units were not confining their illegal wildlife trading practices to tigers. Sarin accused MPs of having killed three female elephants in Chom Khsan district in February and then selling the meat.

Men Pimean, Director of the Wildlife Protection Office of the Department of Forestry and Wildlife in Phnom Penh, informed the Post that he had specifically invited police and military officials to the Preah Vihear tiger conservation seminar in order to confront them with charges of collusion in the hunting of endangered species.

"Military units in your district are using land mines to kill banteng [an endangered species of wild cattle], what are you prepared to do about it?" Pimean asked a Rovieng district official present at the workshop.

The Rovieng district official's response reflected the difficulties of wildlife protection measures in the face of active official connivance in the endangered wildlife trade.

"It's difficult to advise the military in this situation," the official told Pimean. "They have guns and I don't."

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Phnom Penh Post, Issue 8/8, April 13-29, 1999
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