Friday July 3, 2009

Illegal bark strippers jailed for 10 months

By RUBEN SARIO

KOTA KINABALU: A joint effort between Sabah police and the Forestry Department to curb the illegal harvesting of mangrove wood in the north eastern region of Sabah is paying off.

Marine police detained a vessel at Tanjung Semangat in Beluran district, some 250km from the city, after discovering 177 bundles of the Tangar tree bark, a mangrove species, on board.

Sabah police officials said last year that essential oils of the Tangar tree bark was used in the Philippines in the manufacture of alcoholic beverages.

Sabah Forestry director Datuk Sam Mannan said on Tuesday the bark, with an estimated market value of RM70,800, was believed to have been stripped from trees extracted in mangrove reserves.

He said 20 men on board the vessel detained by a Marine Police team headed by Sjn Suhaimi Abdul Halim on May 24 were arrested.

Stripped bare: The illegal harvesting of the bark of the Tangar tree, a mangrove wood species, have left the mangrove forests in Sabah marred with bare patches.

Mannan said 19 of the crewmen were without identification documents and were believed to be illegal immigrants.

He said Marine police handed over the case to the Forestry Department and on June 2, the 19 foreigners were charged in court for being in illegal possession of forest produce. They were subsequently jailed for 10 months by the Sandakan Magistrate Court.

“This case is a culmination of several other operations successfully conducted by the Marine Police in concert with the Forestry Department, over the last two years, to combat illegal bark stripping,” Mannan said.

He said this has resulted in the arrest and successful prosecution of 40 suspects over the last two years and the seizure of 912 bundles of tangar, three vessels, three chain saws and 23 small boats and engines and various contraptions used for extracting tangar bark.

“The northern mangrove forests of the Pitas coastline are isolated.

“Hence making it easy for the culprits to go undetected and escape to neighbouring countries due to the proximity of international waters,” he added.

Source:

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