Dozens of trees were illegally felled in the protective forest in Bach Thong district, Bac Kan province. (Photo: VNA)Bac Kan (VNA) - Police in Bach Thong district of northern Bac Kan provincehave reported that they are rushing to file prosecution documents against peopleinvolved in recent incidents of illegal deforestation.
Nearly 60trees were chopped down in the protective forest in the area between thedistrict's Sy Binh and Vu Muon communes.
Rangersalso found many trees which cut into small pieces in streams and at theforest's edge.
This isconsidered the largest ever destruction of natural forest land in the district.
Accordingto Trinh Vu Ngan, head of the district’s police division, three of the 15people who have been summoned in the case are local officials.
The casewas kept secret from commune authorities and forest rangers. Many locals knewabout the situation but were afraid to denounce the offending parties, thenewspaper reported. As a result, the deforestation continued unchecked for along time.
Trieu VanTue, a forest ranger in charge of Si Binh commune, explained that his unitholds regular checks but had not yet patrolled the damaged area, so they didnot know about the deforestation.
He alsosaid the patrol system was ineffective because each ranger was in charge ofprotecting more than 2,000sq.km of forest.
The deforestationwas the fault of local forest rangers, said Nguyen Huu Thang, head of the BacKan Forest Protection Sub-Department.
DinhQuang Cam, Chairman of the People’s Committee of Vu Muon commune also admittedthe situation was partly due to poor management.-VNA
VNA
