X Close   Friday November 16, 2012  Gaharu thieves’ mini village
was the ‘perfect hideout’  GEORGE TOWN: A group of agarwood tree
(gaharu) thieves set up four large camps deep inside a jungle
near Mount Erskine to cleverly hide their location from view.
Their “mini village” had a kitchen, a storage place and a
workshop to process the agarwood.  It was a perfect hideout
until the state Forestry Department officers busted it on
Monday.  A stockpile of food comprising some 10kg of rice,
cooking oil, canned food and vegetables enough to last several
people for at least two weeks was confiscated.  Department
officers visited the site again yesterday and recovered several
pieces of low quality agarwood.  “We believe the higher quality
ones were sold earlier,” said state Forestry Department director
Abdul Wahab Deraman.  Two Cambodians were arrested during the
ambush on Monday while two others managed to flee the scene.
Two large pieces of agarwood, believed to be worth between
RM50,000 and RM100,000, were also se