Nature Alert: Four Arrested For Illegal Logs

Tuesday, 11 September 2007

Four Arrested For Illegal Logs

Four Arrested For Illegal Logs

Source: The Jakarta Post - September 4, 2007
JAMBI, Jambi province

Police in Tebo regency, Jambi, have arrested four people on suspicion of transporting processed wood taken from illegally felled logs, Jambi Police spokesman Adj. Sr. Comr. Yatim Suyatmo said Monday. The four were arrested as they were driving three trucks full of wood near Kuamang village in Kuta Ulu district, Tebo, Yatim said.

Police detained the four for further questioning when they were unable to produce the necessary documents for the wood, he said. Yatim said police confiscated 24 cubic meters of woods and the three trucks as evidence.

"The arrests and confiscation of the wood and trucks shows we are serious about fighting illegal logging," he said. National Police chief Gen. Sutanto earlier ordered his officers around the country to make fighting illegal logging a priority. Officers are still searching for unlicensed sawmills in the area that are supplying illegal wood to buyers, Yatim said. -- JP

Hall of Shame for President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono and the Palm Oil Industry.

Nothing can prepare one for the sight of the systematic extermination of orangutans by the government of Indonesia.

Look at the photos and news articles on these pages in the context of a statement the President made to the media on 10th December 2007.

“In the last 35 years about 50,000 orangutans are estimated to have been lost as their habitats shrank. If this continues, this majestic creature will likely face extinction by 2050,” President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono said at the launch of an orangutan conservation plan at the climate talks in Bali.

“The fate of the orangutan is a subject that goes to the heart of sustainable forests … To save the orangutan we have to save the forest.”

Statements like these are most welcome, but unless backed up by action, such words fall on deaf ears within the Ministry of Forestry....who are busy granting licences to cut down the very forests the President says they should protect!

When you think you are to busy to help, please could you reflect for a moment on .........

The following extract refers to environmental problems in general. I just hope you find it as thought provoking and relevant to orangutans as I have.

"This is such a shocking and unpalatable fact that most people deny it, or they just don't want to think about it. They believe as individuals, they can do little about it, so push it to the back of their minds. But I can't do that.

When something has to be done, we need to do it. It doesn't matter how big the challenge is or how hard the solution; if I know something is wrong, and I am in a position to help, I will do my best to make it right." Duncan Bannatyne, successful British businessman.