New Tang Dynasty Television
21st April, 2011
Cambodian protesters clashed with police on Thursday over a long running dispute for a luxury housing estate. Rights groups and foreign aid donors have complained that state officials are forcibly evicting farmers, villagers and city residents to sell prime land to foreign and local businesses.
Police armed with shields, sticks and electric batons broke up the group of about one hundred protesters who had gathered in front of Phnom Penh City Hall.
[Chan Tha, Protester]:
"I am suffering. I am a Khmer like others. Why are they doing this to the people? They fight, they beat people with no mercy, they do not find solutions for the people."
The estate is to be built by a Chinese developer and a well-connected Cambodian tycoon.
[Am Sam Ath, Human Rights Activist]:
"I think that the authorities were too harsh on the protesters. I know that they want to restore the public order. But they should find another peaceful solution for everyone."
According to a Cambodian group monitoring forced evictions, 30-thousand people were moved off their land last year. And an estimated 150-thousand more evictions are expected in the next few years.
Officials have argued that the planned urban development will help the Cambodian capital.
Phnom Penh's Boeng Kak Lake is being bulldozed to make way for a luxury housing estate to be built by China's Inner Mongolia Erdos Hongjun Investment Corp. It has pledged to spend $3 billion in Cambodia on real estate, metal processing and power generation.
More than 2,700 families have already been driven from their homes around Boeng Kak and around and 1,500 refusing to leave, protesting each day and rejecting the developer's compensation of just $8,500. Their latest demand is for 688 square feet of lake land to be left for each family.
The property developer, Shukaku Inc., plans to build high-end shopping centers and housing on the new land.
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