The National Court has found controversial Malaysian logging giant, Rimbunan Hijau, guilty of intimidating, threatening and harassing the Post Courier newspaper and abusing court processes in order to try and stop publication of reports critical of their logging operations.

The Court has also ordered Rimbunan Hijau's lawyer, Michael Wilson be charged with perjury for filing sworn evidence "that defies the truth with intend [sic] to mislead the court".

The full National court decision is attached below as a downloadable pdf file.

The courts highly critical findings came after the Post Courier applied to dismiss defamation proceedings brought by Rimbunan Hijau in 2006 following publication of an article alleging environmental damage, human rights abuses and corruption.

In dismissing the defamation action against the Post Courier, the Court found that Rimbunan Hijau had done nothing to prosecute its claim and had simply been abusing the process of the court to try and silence criticism of its logging operations.

This is not the first time Rimbunan Hijau has had defamation cases dismissed. Earlier this year two cases against the PNG Eco-Forestry Forum were also thrown out of Court with Rimbunan Hijau ordered to pay costs.

Last week, Rimbunan Hijau aslo lost a court case challenging its logging rights to the huge Kamula Doso forest concession in Western Province with the court ordering that there had never been any valid acquisition of timber rights from the landowners.