PHNOM PENH, Apr 21 (NNN-AKP) – Four villagers were killed and two others were wounded, in a landmine explosion in north-east Cambodia’s Mondulkiri province, yesterday, a mine clearance chief, said.
Heng Ratana, director-general of the Cambodian Mine Action Centre (CMAC), said, the war-left landmine erupted late yesterday afternoon, about 10 km from Sre Y village, in Sen Monorom town.
“According to preliminary information, four persons were pronounced dead and two others were injured in the blast,” Ratana wrote on social media.
He added that, there were children among the victims.
Last month, an eight-year-old boy was killed and his two younger sisters were also seriously wounded, in a landmine explosion in north-west Cambodia’s Oddar Meanchey province.
Cambodia is one of the world’s worst countries suffered from mines and unexploded ordnances (UXOs), as a result of three decades of war and internal conflicts, from the mid-1960s until 1998. An estimated four million to six million land mines and other munitions are left-over from the conflicts.
In a social media post on Feb 27, Ratana said, an estimated more than four million tonnes of aerial bombs and 27 million cluster bombs, had been dropped on some 115,273 locations throughout Cambodia, by more than 500,000 U.S. bombing missions, between mid-1965 and 1973.
From 1979 to 2023, landmine and UXO explosions had claimed 19,822 lives, and either injured or amputated 45,215 others in the country, according to an official report.– NNN-AKP