More than 700 Oddar Meanchey families on Friday won an appeal in a Bangkok court to pursue a class-action lawsuit against a Thai sugar company, more than 10 years after their houses were burned and razed by military forces including those allegedly hired by the plantation.
Advocacy groups said the decision was “a watershed moment” for human rights, and could set a precedent for holding corporations accountable across the region.
Cambodian residents have been in a dispute with Cambodian companies linked to Thai conglomerate Mitr Phol, which calls itself the world’s third-largest sugar producer, since 2008. The more than 700 Cambodian villagers in the class-action lawsuit say that after the government granted economic land concessions to companies including Angkor Sugar, a Mitr Phol subsidiary, police, military police and others took their land and burned, razed and destroyed their homes.
