A protest drawing several thousand people from across Angkor Archaeological Park took an abrupt turn Friday, when the land management minister said there were no plans for a mass relocation from the park’s Preah Dak commune – days after residents said authorities had told them the opposite.
Prime Minister Hun Sen on Thursday denied plans to relocate thousands of residents from one area of the Angkor Archaeological Park following protests.
Around 3,000 people protested outside the Preah Dak commune office Wednesday after the Apsara Authority asked them to move to the Run Ta Ek resettlement site, the latest in a series of evictions sweeping the Angkor Archaeological Park.
Prime Minister Hun Sen has warned that families who refuse to accept government compensation to leave the Angkor area and try to bargain for higher compensation will face eviction.
Around two dozen families in Siem Reap’s Run Ta Ek commune — soon to be the new home for evicted residents from the Angkor park — say the Apsara Authority took their farmland within the resettlement site and offered much smaller plots in return.
Officials have ordered the owners of about 57 souvenir and restaurant stalls near Angkor Wat to take down their stands and leave the complex by Friday, but vendors petitioned for relocation inside the park.
Prime Minister Hun Sen handed out gifts and promised metal sheeting as building materials to families who have agreed to vacate their homes that fall within Siem Reap’s Angkor park, saying the relocation site in Run Ta Ek commune will be turned into a modern satellite city.
The Apsara Authority in Siem Reap has continued demolitions of private structures in the Angkor temple park this week while providing land compensation for affected families in what appears to be a major new development area west of the city.
Authorities say hundreds of families have volunteered to relocate from the Angkor Archaeological Park area following a warning to demolish houses and shops, though others say they are still in the midst of negotiations and are reluctant to leave.
Land Minister Chea Sophara on Wednesday warned people living near Angkor Wat not to protest an ongoing order to demolish what his ministry has deemed illegally built structures that affect the beauty of the temple area.
VOD is an independent media outlet producing radio programs and disseminating information to the public via the Internet.
© 2019 VOD. All Rights Reserved.
