Six injured as police, Borei Keila villagers clash
At least six people were injured on Friday when a small group of Borei Keila villagers were evicted from the grounds of an unfinished building in Phnom Penh that they began occupying this week in a bid to draw attention to a years-long fight for proper replacement housing. As dawn over above the trash-strewn site, the road was blocked and riot police and Prampi Makara district security guards descended on about 30 villagers, who had been sleeping on thin mats under the first floor. Villagers, including a woman who was eight months pregnant, were beaten as the authorities forced them away from the building and pushed them back in the direction of a fetid tent alley that the villagers have called home ever since being violently evicted from an adjacent area in January 2012. “I think that they are inhumane in the way they treat us,” said Has Sokchenda. “Even though I am heavily pregnant, they used sticks to beat me up on my back and they also stepped on my right thigh. … Friday’s clash was the latest in a long and often desperate saga that began in 2007, when Phanimex, a firm owned by well-connected businesswoman Suy Sophan, was granted 2.6 hectares of land to develop in the area. The villagers on whose land Phanimex wanted to build were told that 10 apartment blocks would be erected for them in an adjacent site in exchange for moving. Instead, Ms. Sophan’s company only built eight, leaving a number of families homeless and forcing them to erect shacks on the land. In January 2012, hundreds of armed police and military police violently clashed with more than 200 of the villagers and bulldozed the shelters of 300 families before sending them to a desolate relocation site 45 km away. Some returned to Borei Keila, however, and now eke out an existence in a filthy tent alley behind the apartment blocks. … The riot and security officials were supported by a phalanx of men carrying Gendarmerie Royale Khmer riot shields, indicating that they are military police. This group was seen retreating along with the other officials once the barricade was erected. Brigadier General Kheng Tito, spokesman for the military police, said they were not involved in the clash. “Our military police were not involved in the clash with Borei Keila residents,” he said. “They were present to prevent the further destruction of state and private property.”
Khuon Narim and Lauren Crothers
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/six-injured-as-police-borei-keila-villagers-clash-52325/
