French ACCOR group must stop cooperating with Malaysian loggers
from Bruno Manser Fonds
BMF launches new campaign against Interhill Logging and demands the French hotel group’s withdrawal from the controversial NOVOTEL INTERHILL project
Europe’s leading hotel group, ACCOR, ought to withdraw from the controversial NOVOTEL INTERHILL hotel project in Sarawak (Malaysia). This is what the Bruno Manser Fund (BMF) is demanding in a letter to ACCOR CEO, Gilles Pélisson, published today. According to the ACCOR plans, the 4.5-star hotel in the Sarawak capital of Kuching, which is currently under construction, will offer 388 hotel rooms over a total of 23 stories. It is being implemented jointly with the Malaysian tropical timber company, Interhill.
“Interhill has been logging Sarawak’s tropical rainforest since the end of the 1980s and bears decisive responsibility for the ongoing destruction of the very basis of the Penan’s existence”, said Lukas Straumann, Director of the Bruno Manser Fund. “We are shocked by ACCOR’s cooperation with Interhill, since it is completely at odds with ACCOR’s ecological and social standards.”
The Bruno Manser Fund states that the Penan have been protesting against the Interhill logging company since the end of the 1980s by setting up blockades on logging roads. Interhill is operating with a timber concession for 55’000 hectares of tropical forest. According to Penan sources, Interhill has had the Penan intimidated by armed thugs on various occasions for purposes of asserting its interests vis-à-vis the local communities. The Malaysian police are currently investigating alleged cases of sexual abuse of Penan women by Interhill workers in Sarawak’s Middle Baram region.
With 150,000 employees and annual sales of EUR 7.7 billion (2008), ACCOR is Europe’s leading hotel provider. The membership of the ACCOR Board of Directors also includes a former top politician from Germany, namely the one-time Finance Minister, Theo Waigel. ACCOR operates more than 4000 hotels worldwide, including 47 hotels in Switzerland.
Help the Penan save the rainforest, sign the online petition!
from Bruno Manser Fonds
Dear friends,
today, the Bruno Manser Fonds (BMF) has started a new campaign against the Malaysian Interhill group. For over twenty years, Interhill has been logging tropical rainforests in Sarawak’s Middle Baram region (East Malaysia/Borneo) with devastating environmental and social consequences. The affected Penan communities are currently struggling to protect their last forest reserves against Interhill’s bulldozers.
As a part of this campaign, an online petition has been launched which asks the French ACCOR group to stop its cooperation with Interhill. ACCOR has been accorded a management contract for the planned Novotel Interhill hotel project in Kuching/Sarawak, in which Interhill is reinvesting the profits obtained from loigging the Penan’s forests.
Please sign BMF’s online petition on www.stop-interhill.com and forward this message to your friends.
Thank you very much!
Your BMF campaign team
2 Comments so far
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What Rainforest? 
what the hell!!!as if u guys really know what is really happening in sarawak.i’m a sarawakian and i don’t think there’s in any problem about the indigenous people here.you guys are some got for nothing outsiders!!
Comment by bumiputera October 1, 2009 @ 6:23 amHey Bumiputera,
If ‘good-for-nothing’ can find out so much that is going wrong, I wonder what does that make of you who professed to be a Sarawakian. I supposed you’re in the category of the likes of Taib Mahmud, James Masing and Lihan Jok – outsiders are jealous of our progress and therefore they’re sabotaging us. And I supposed these so-called outsiders include officials from the Penan rape victims task force, among them are representatives from the Sarawak women affairs ministry!
Comment by hornbill October 12, 2009 @ 5:47 am