The remains of a house after it was burned by armed forces in Trapeang Prasath district on 10 December

Nineteen villagers have been imprisoned in a series of arrests which started in September 2022 in connection to an ongoing land dispute with Sok Samnang Development Co., Ltd. in Oddar Meanchey’s Trapeang Prasath district.

Armed forces wielding batons mobilised to arrest eight villagers and oversaw houses being burned in the conflicted area in the latest violent episode on 9 and 10 December. Gendarmes – also known as military police – arrested five women and three men over the course of the two days. A video taken on 10 December shows gendarmeries wielding long batons while arresting a villager and intimidating others from filming. Other videos recorded by villagers that day show their houses in flames. White smoke from the remains of burned houses was still visible when LICADHO monitors arrived that evening.

Gendarmeries wield batons and detain a villager (centre) in a video by villagers in Trapeang Prasath district on 10 December

“Authorities must immediately stop this senseless violence," said Naly Pilorge, outreach director of LICADHO. "These land conflicts must be resolved peacefully, not through terror campaigns of arrest and destruction."

The eight arrested villagers are currently in pre-trial detention, alongside a growing number of villagers who are imprisoned in connection to the conflict. Seven men were arrested by police forces wielding automatic rifles in September. A further two men and two women were arrested in November. These 19 villagers are now awaiting trial in Oddar Meanchey’s provincial prison.

Deforestation, Opportunities and Conflict
The land conflict involves roughly 370 families who began settling in the area in 2012 amid deforestation and land clearing by Sok Samnang Development Co., Ltd., which claims ownership of the disputed area.

A map outlines the Economic Land Concession granted to Sok Samnang Development Co., Ltd., deforestation rate and location of villagers’ burned houses in Oddar Meanchey’s Trapeang Prasath district

The company was granted an Economic Land Concession (ELC) spanning 1,865 hectares of forested land in the Kulen Promtep Wildlife Sanctuary in March 2012. After removing the valuable timber from the forested area, the company failed to develop the full area, establishing a plantation on only part of the concession.

Families from five provinces across Cambodia began peacefully migrating to the formerly forested land, with their move facilitated by a local authority’s relative. Families have since been farming the land or working in nearby rubber plantations.

The land conflict erupted in 2021 when provincial authorities began warning families that they were encroaching on the company’s land and pressuring them to stop farming. The severity of violence has since rapidly escalated, with armed forces burning houses and arresting villagers.

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