Six forest community representatives in Kampong Speu province’s Oral district were questioned by the Provincial Court on Wednesday for intentionally causing damage, threatening, publicly insulting, and incitement.
According to the court summons dated February 7, the six activists are being sued by Ben Sarith, who is a military officer with the Command Tank Unit. However, the villagers claim that they were the ones being threatened by the soldiers who had cleared the land.
Soeng Sokhom, one of six people questioned by the court, said he is being accused of inciting other people to encroach on state forest land.
“I think this is unfair to me because I have not acted as charged and I ask the court to drop the case against me and other villagers,” he said. “We are just protecting state property for the public interest, but we are being accused instead while the authorities have not done a thorough study on the case.”
In April 2003, the Ministry of Environment declared part of the land a community-protected area.
In August last year, the government issued a sub-decree that privatized 262.24 hectares of forest land near Pormeas village in Oral district’s Trapaing Chor commune. It said the land was for members of the army to build houses and farms.
Scores of villagers protested against the move in November when a group of soldiers from the Command Tank Unit came to demarcate the land boundary and started clearing it with a bulldozer.
The move has turned local villagers into environmental activists. They have pitched tents at the foot of Oral Mountain to prevent the forest from being cleared.
Villagers claimed that on Tuesday, soldiers used violence against villagers who tried to stop the army from clearing forest land.
During the questioning, nearly 500 villagers came to protest in front of the court, demanding the case be dropped.
Kak Soeun, a villager who joined the protest at the court, said that three villagers were beaten by soldiers while trying to prevent them from clearing forest land.
“They shot gunfire into the sky and beat me. They told the people to stop coming here to interrupt and obstruct their activities, or we will be shot,” he said.
Chay Kimhorn, who also joined the protest, said, “We are here to support our representatives who are being questioned by the court. We are a community of people who love the forest and the environment, we just want to prevent the trees from being cut down,” he said.
Local authorities at all levels have claimed that they are not aware of the violence against the people made by the soldiers.
Mao Phalla, a spokesman for the Royal Cambodian Army, declined to comment, saying that he was not aware of the incident.
Tep Nem, Trapaing Chor commune chief, said that the authorities told villagers to stop protesting because the land has been legally given to the military.
“They continue an illegal activity while the land has already been given to the military families by the state, in accordance with the law,” he said.
Local rights group Licadho said in a brief report that three villagers were injured in the violence on Tuesday, including a 23-year-old man, a 41-year-old man, and a 59-year-old woman
It also said that the ongoing land dispute involves more than 253 families, many of whom have mobilized for months to protect their forested land.
Roth Thavy, the Kampong Speu coordinator for the rights group Adhoc, also said the group had received information about military violence. He said three people were arrested and beaten before they were released.
“It is unacceptable because Cambodia has laws and it needs to follow the law and respect human rights,” he said. “The accusation is an injustice for villagers because they are just protecting the forest for the community’s interest and not for the individual,” he said.
