<p>Villagers from Chana District, Songkhla, have returned home after a week of protest against the Chana industrial estate project, following a cabinet resolution issued on Tuesday (14 December).</p>

<p>Villagers from Chana District, Songkhla Province, have returned to Ratchadamnoen Avenue to protest against the Chana industrial project after they were <a href="https://prachatai.com/english/node/9597">arrested</a> on Monday night (6 December) while protesting in front of Government House.</p>

<p>The Kaeng Krachan Forest Complex was named a natural World Heritage site during the World Heritage Committee meeting on 26 July despite ongoing concerns about human rights violations against indigenous communities in the forest area.&nbsp;</p>

<p>Thailand&rsquo;s nomination of the Kaeng Krachan Forest Complex for World Heritage status should once again be deferred due to concerns about violations of the rights of local indigenous communities, says the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).</p>

<p>MPs from the Move Forward Party (MFP) have proposed a new bill to protect indigenous rights and cultures.</p>

<p>87 members of the Bang Kloi indigenous Karen community, who travelled back to the location of their former village in the Kaeng Krachan forest, have been forcibly taken out of the forest and arrested by park officials, police, and military officers.</p>

<p>After being forcibly evacuated from their ancestral homeland in the Kaeng Krachan forest twice, the Bang Kloi indigenous Karen community has been facing community rights issues, which remain unresolved. The community is now at risk of another forced evacuation, while Thailand still has no legislation protecting indigenous rights.</p>

<p>Following a report that&nbsp;members of the Bang Kloi Karen community have returned to their ancestral land at Chai Phaen Din, the remaining community members and a network of civil society organizations have issued a statement calling for the authorities to allow the community to stay at Chai Phaen Din until a resolution is reached, and must not conduct any operation that affects them.&nbsp;</p>

<p>After the boundary of the Kaeng Krachan National Park was re-drawn, Wansao Phungam, a Karen indigenous villager, was charged with encroaching on national park land for farming on a piece of land which has been passed down within her family.</p>

<p>Concern continues to rise among civil society for the safety of members of the Bang Kloi Karen indigenous community who returned to their ancestral land at Chai Phaen Din in the Kaeng Krachan forest, after reports of a possible military operation to evacuate them from the forest. &nbsp;</p>

<p>The Director-General of the Department of Special Investigation will visit the Dong Ma Fai Subdistrict in Nong Bua Lamphu to investigate the murders of local community&nbsp;rights defenders, but will not be able to meet with the activists&#39; families as the visit was scheduled without consultation with the community.&nbsp;</p>

<p>The Appeal Court has sentenced a villager in Lampang to 1 year in prison and a fine of 400,000 baht for encroaching on national park land, despite evidence that the plot in question has been occupied since 1954.</p>