Sunday, November 21, 2010

Three Villagers Fired by Police in Kampong Thom

A case of violence occurred involving weapons at around 12:00 at day time on March 7, 2010 by a group of joint armed forces in Banteay Rongeang village, Kraya commune, Santuk district, Kampong Thom province, who were accused of setting fire at around 30 to 40 former villagers in the above areas, resulted in 3 wounded.

Those perpetrators were 11 police officers and soldiers, from Kampong Thom province, who have been hired to protect Vietnamese Tan Bien Rubber Plantation Company, which was granted economic land concession of 8,100 hectares by the Cambodian Government in 2007, which also forcedly evicted former disabled soldiers from the area late 2009. Those three victims in the event included Chhum Chorm, 41, who was shot at his abdomen; Tuot Veasna, 36, got a shot at his left ankle; and his brother Tuot Chanka, 39, got once at his knee and the other at his thigh. The two brothers were sent to hospital in Kampong Thom. Whereas the other victim, Chhum Chorm could not afford the fee of treatment at hospital, but he was sent to his relative in Kampong Cham province to cure at home.

Related to the afore-mentioned event on March 7, 2010 Kampong Thom Deputy Police Chief Chou Sam Ath brought charges against those villagers of attacking about 11 provincial police officers with sticks and machetes, caused the officers to discharge their weapons accidentally. Moreover, he had filed criminal complaints against 8 out of those villagers for inciting them to take over the company land. He accused those 8 people of having never lived on the concession land.

However, Mrs. Kim Seng, 61, the mother of those two brothers, who was also present at the attack, said that those policemen opened fire at the villagers as they were returning into their former land in order to do the farming because they had not received any plot of land in exchange in the new area, where the authority promised to give them.

Echoing Mrs. Kim Seng’s words, Mr. Chheng Sophors, Senior Human Rights Monitor for Licadho asserted Friday, March 12, 2010 that all of the villagers were those who lived in Kraya commune and were forcedly evicted in December 2009. However, related to the eight villagers, who had been facing legal action, he had not yet got the indentify or information of them. With respect to the above event, he claimed as what Mrs. Kim Seng mentioned that about 30 to 40 villagers came back to the concession land with machetes, axes, and grub-hoes in order to do the farming for a living because they faced difficulties with landlessness, but when they arrived at the place, they were shot by a group of 11 joint armed forces, provincial police officers and soldiers.

Consequently the above act of those authorities has been seen as cruel and criminal offense, which seriously abused the Cambodian Law and also severely violated human rights.

The act is absolutely prohibited by the Cambodian Constitution, the Universal Declaration on Human Rights, and also the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Right to life is the inevitable basic right, which all human beings shall respect for. No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

On behalf of the government authorities, the police officers should have protected their people. They should not have treated the villagers this way. In addition, the intention of the deputy police chief to lodge complaints against 8 villages for incitement is only the way to intimidate villagers from protesting against the company over their land having been grabbed and also to hide their misconduct as well as to escape from their responsibility of the above event.

The Cambodian Center for Human Rights strongly condemned the above inhuman act of those 11 provincial police officers and soldiers, who cruelly opened fire at those innocent people. The act shall not be forgiven at all.

Therefore, CCHR would call on the Cambodian national government to take immediate action to bring those perpetrators to justice.

Moreover, the government has to guarantee that those villages should be provided with a new social land concession in exchange with their former land, which was granted to the company as economic land concession, so that they will be able to survive by doing farming.

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