Five people were arrested over a land dispute with Rath Sambath company in Samlot district’s Ta Tork commune in Battambang on June 22, according to reports from local media outlet CamboJA.

Six people were summoned by the director of the provincial department of agriculture and accused of trespassing and infringing on company property, but only five were detained and questioned, according to news reports in English and Khmer.

A villager said people had been living on the land since 1993, but in 2011, the Rath Sambath company received a land concession and evicted the villagers. In 2017, villagers heard the company had returned the land back to the state and went to reclaim their plots. More than 200 families have lived on about 552 hectares of land since 2021, villagers said.

The representatives were detained at the commune office after the commune chief had called them there on the pretense of solving the dispute, villagers said, after the situation escalated earlier in June when around 200 people installed a Cambodian People’s Party banner in front of the Rath Sambath company.

When the community learned their representatives had been detained, about 200 people went to protest in front of the provincial court, saying they would stay until the representatives were released. But people were forced to leave after around a dozen homes were demolished by authorities, villagers claimed. Authorities denied demolishing any homes but said they had asked people to leave the area.

Commune chief Un Khem said the land was under control of the Ministry of Agriculture, with the original concession to Rath Sambath covering about 5,000 hectares. He said that villagers were given 2,000 hectares in recent years.

Rath Sambath was registered as a rubber concession in 2009, according to Open Development Cambodia. The Commerce Ministry lists the company as registered in 2003 and chaired by Menh Kanharath.