Tiong Hiew King, founder of giant Asian logging conglomerate Rimbunan Hijau, a company accused of systematically stripping the "paradise" forests of Indonesia, Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands

This article is more than 11 years old

This article is more than 11 years old

Environment groups around the world have called for a billionaire businessman to be stripped of his knighthood after claiming that his fortune has been built on the systematic destruction of tropical rainforests.

Tiong Hiew King, the founder of giant Asian logging conglomerate Rimbunan Hijau, was awarded an honorary knighthood "for services to commerce, the community and charitable organisations in Papua New Guinea" in the Queen's birthday honours list last month.

Rimbunan Hijau, which has hundreds of subsidiaries, operates in south-east Asia and Africa, and is the biggest extractor of tropical timber from Papua New Guinea.

The company has also been highly active in the Solomon Islands, which campaigners say has been stripped almost bare of its indigenous forests by a handful of Asian logging syndicates including King's companies.

The award to Tiong, whose personal wealth is estimated at over $2.7bn, escaped notice until now - having not been published in any British newspaper.

Honorary awards for foreign nationals are not published in Britain and are made public only at the discretion of foreign governments.

Yesterday both the UK government and Buckingham palace distanced themselves from the appointment.

"The palace would have decided on the award," said a spokesman for the Foreign Office.

"The prime minister of Papua New Guinea, supported by the governor general, would have made the recommendation to the queen. It would then have been cleared by the Foreign Office and the Malaysian government," said a spokesman for the palace.

Survival International and other groups today accused Tiong's timber companies of systematically stripping the "paradise" forests of Indonesia, Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands for over 30 years.

"It's outrageous that Tiong Hiew King has been given an honorary knighthood. His company is responsible for the destruction of vast areas of forest belonging to the Penan tribe in Sarawak, Borneo, many of whom now have difficulty finding enough food as the animals they hunt have fled Tiong's bulldozers. Britain must stop honouring people who abuse tribal people's rights," said Stephen Cory, director of Survival International.

"His global logging empire is responsible for the destruction of huge swathes of pristine rainforest in south-east Asia. If the Queen knew what he was responsible for she would have knighted him with a chainsaw, not a sword," said a spokesman for Greenpeace.

"Tiong Hiew King is unfit for a knighthood. He is commonly known to be one of the chief people responsible for widespread logging in both Papua New Guinea and other countries," said Lukas Straumann of the Bruno Manser Foundation, which was set up following the death of the Swiss environmentalist.

"We are shocked by the award and would like to write a formal letter of protest to Prince Charles and Queen Elizabeth to deprive him of this honour as it is a joke based on the record of his company's activities in our country," said a spokesman for the Papua New Guinea Eco-Forestry forum.

Prince Charles, who visited south-east Asia last year to plead with government leaders to protect forests has led a global initiative to defend tropical rainforests which are being felled at an alarming rate.

A spokesman for Clarence House, which represents Prince Charles, today declined to comment.

The Rimbunan Hijau company website says the jobs it creates for local communities improves their quality of life and that welfare and environmental protection of societies is a major driving force for the company.

Tiong declined to comment.