Kraya villagers fear health crisis

Photo by: Heng Chivoan

Villagers from the beseiged Kraya commune in Kampong Thom province say they have been forced to hide in cassava fields for fear of arrest and now face increasing health risks from a lack of medicine and the threat of malaria from sleeping outdoors. Authorities blockaded the commune following a violent protest last month over their impending eviction, during which equipment belonging to the Vietnamese-owned rubber company Tin Bean was set on fire.

(Posted by CAAI News Media)

Friday, 27 November 2009 15:04 May Titthara

Kampong Thom

THE ongoing seige at Kraya commune threatens to create a health crisis, villagers warned on Thursday.

“Now we have health problems such as diarrhoea because we don’t have any rice to eat, so we have to resort to dried cassava,” said Lam Leoung, 52.

Medical supplies in the besieged village have also become a problem, villagers said. “We still have some medicines that NGOs have given us, but we need more medicine for treatment. People’s health is worse now because of the cool season,” Lam Leoung said.

Pleas to lift the blockade, which has penned residents in since a clash with military police on November 16, have fallen on deaf ears. The blockade was set up after villagers torched vehicles in protest of their looming eviction by Tin Bean, a Vietnamese rubber firm that was granted the 8,000-hectare plot in 2007. Seven people have been arrested.

Many villagers have sought refuge in the nearby cassava fields, fearing their homes will be burned to the ground. The date for the eviction has been delayed until next week, but supplies are increasingly scarce. Mong Saroeun, 45, usually sells medicine from home. “Before, people in this village could depend on my house for soup and medicine, but now I’ve had to close because the supplies are gone and I can’t go buy any more,” she said.

Photo by: Heng Chivoan

The scorched remains of an excavator belonging to the Tin Bean rubber company in Kraya commune, where villagers facing a land eviction set company equipment on fire during a protest last month. HENG CHIVOAN

Am Sam Ath, a Licadho researcher based in the village, said: “Even thought they have a conflict with the authorities, the authorities still have to allow doctors to treat them because health is the first priority.”

Pich Sophea, Santuk district governor, refused to respond to calls for lifting the blockade on Thursday, saying only: “I don’t know yet.”