ORANG Asli from six kampung have formed several blockades in Gua Musang, Kelantan, this morning to protest against the logging activities in the forest reserve which encroach into their land.

Mohd Syafiq Dendi, chairman of the customary land territory in Pos Simpor, said the protesters have set up three blockades at Chawas, Tohoi and Kuala Wok early today.

“The blockades started this morning. This is against logging and commercial farming. 

“They are encroaching into Orang Asli territory. Stop the logging now,” he told The Malaysian Insight. 

The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights has noted persistent problems with land grabs in Papua New Guinea.

Zeid Ra'ad al-Hussein visited Port Moresby last week and met with PNG's prime minister Peter O'Neill and civil society figures.

Mr Zeid found that corruption remains rife in PNG, affecting the right to land of its citizens. His spokesperson, Ravina Shamdasani, conveyed this concern in an interview with UN Radio.

In the fight for land and to protect the environment, communities around the world are struggling against governments, companies and criminal gangs

MUMBAI, Feb 6 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Last week's killing of Cambodian forest defenders, and the recent shooting of Indonesian farmers, show the increasing involvement of state forces in quelling dissent against agribusiness, campaigners said.

UN indigenous rights chief urges Chile to stop using the country's anti-terrorism law to prosecute the Mapuche people

BOGOTA, Jan 11 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Latin America is trampling on indigenous rights and jailing ever more campaigners to stifle opposition to big business taking over ancestral lands, according to a United Nations expert.

A Myanmar land rights activist who challenged illegal land grabs in northern Shan State was beaten to death this week by a mob of some 20 people, a fellow unionist told RFA’s Myanmar Service on Thursday.

Htay Aung, a member of the National Farmer’s Union was attacked by a mob on Wednesday in Iwine Parhe Village of Naungcho Township, northeast of the city of Mandalay and later died at Mandalay Hospital.

Santiago Maldonado was last seen alive in public in Patagonia on August 1 at a protest for the land rights of the Mapuche, a group of indigenous peoples from Chile and Argentina. Various witnesses recount seeing him being detained by military police and loaded into a van during a raid by state authorities, but there is no official record of his detention, and no information was provided to his family.

Pipeline company downplaying major legal and financial risks of crossing unceded First Nations territory in British Columbia

The community council in the area has repeatedly denounced human rights violations against the Afro-Colombian, Mestizo and Indigenous peasants in the region.

A Colombian social leader, Jose Jair Cortes, was murdered in a rural area of Tumaco municipality located in the southwest department of Narino. 

Jair Cortes, a member of the local council of the Alto Mira and Frontera Community, was killed in a sector called Y, located in the heart of the city of Tumaco. The social leader was one of seven community leaders to receive death threats in recent months. 

Deaths of environmental activists locked in conflict with mining, logging and agricultural companies across three continents has passed 150

• Interactive: recording the deaths of environmental activists around the world

The number of people killed this year while defending their community’s land, natural resources or wildlife has passed 150 – meaning 2017 is on course to be the deadliest year on record.

Mining companies have faced community protests and threats to shut operations, but many residents believe only tribal leaders are benefiting

MOGALAKWENA, South Africa, Oct 8 (Reuters) - A new power struggle is unfolding in South Africa’s old homelands between global mining giants, traditional leaders and an impoverished rural populace.

The Ministry of Interior yesterday ordered the temporary suspension of land rights NGO Equitable Cambodia for allegedly violating its own by-laws and the controversial law regulating NGOs passed in 2015.

In a letter signed yesterday, Interior Minister Sar Kheng ordered NGO Director Eang Vuthy to “temporarily suspend Equitable Cambodia’s activities for thirty working days”.

According to the letter, the organisation violated Article 5 of its own by-laws, as well as Articles 10 and 25 of the Law on Associations and NGOs.

[JURIST] Special Rapporteur on human rights and the environment John Knox [official profile] called [press release] on Mongolia Wednesday to protect the environment.