Yai River the Si Nakharin Dam was finished in 1980 and the Tha Thung Na Dam in 1981, while the Khao Laem Dam (renamed Vajiralongkorn Dam) on the Khwae Noi River south of Thung Yai was completed in 1984. The Nam Choan Dam, the last of the projected dams, was supposed to flood a forest area of about 223 km2 within the Thung Yai Naresuan Wildlife Sanctuary. A public dispute about the Nam Choan Dam project lasted for more than six years, dominating national politics and public debate in early-1988 before it was shelved in April that year. Pointing to the high value of Thung Yai for nature conservation and biodiversity, dam opponents on the national and international level raised the possibility of declaring the area a world heritage site. This prestigious option would have been lost with a huge dam and reservoir in the middle of the two wildlife sanctuaries most promising to meet the requirements for a global heritage. After the dam project was shelved, the proposal to UNESCO was written by Seub Nakhasathien and another outspoken opponent of the Nam Choan Dam, and, in December 1991, Thung Yai Naresuan together with the adjoining Huai Kha Khaeng Wildlife Sanctuary was declared a Natural World Heritage Site by UNESCO. In the nomination, the "outstanding universal value" of the two sanctuaries is, in first place, justified with their extraordinary high biodiversity due to their unique position at the junction of four biogeographic zones, as well as with its size and "the undisturbed nature of its habitats". The death of Seub Nakhasathien, the forest conservator instrumental in the UNESCO listing who committed suicide in 1990, transformed the status of Thung Yai Naresuan and the adjacent Huay Kha Kaeng Complex into a sacrosanct site and inspired many young persons to become forest patrol staff. Even though the UNESCO nomination explicitly emphasizes the "undisturbed nature" of the area, and notwithstanding scientific studies supporting traditional settlement and use rights of the Karen people in Thung Yai as well as the sustainability of their traditional land use system and their strong intention to remain in their homeland and to protect it, governmental authorities regard the people living in Thung Yai as a threat to the sanctuary and pursue their resettlement. Karen villages in Huai Kha Khaeng were removed when the sanctuary was established in 1972, and in the late-1970s the remaining communities in Huai Kha