Flooding unearths Cambodia’s landmines

Thanks to intensive demining in Cambodia’s Battambang Province, few residents in Rokha Kiri District have seen landmines in the past two decades, even though the country still ranks as one of the most heavily mined in the world.

But following flooding that has killed an estimated 160 people nationwide since August, Mom Sokhum’s family had a surprise near their farm: an anti-tank mine.

Although Mom was used to handling anti-tank and anti-personnel mines as a soldier during the country’s civil war, in the 1980s and 1990s, he said he was shocked to learn one had washed up nearby.

“I haven’t seen them since [the war against] the Khmer Rouge,” he said, referring to followers of the country’s Communist Party who carried out a genocide from 1975 to 1978. “Although I buried some myself, it still made me feel faint.”

Locals are worried that no one knows where the anti-tank mine came from or how many explosive remnants of war are floating in the floodwaters. The flooding has led to the evacuation of at least 50,000 households as of 20 October, according to the country’s National Committee for Disaster Management. (Read full article here) [source: IRIN]