Bodies of 2 Foreigners Dumped on Riverbank

The bodies of two foreign men apparently tortured and killed were discovered Sunday on a bank of the Mekong River in Phnom Penh, police said.

Local residents in Russei Keo district’s Prek Tasek commune found the two badly beaten bodies around 8 a.m. on the Chroy Changva peninsula, where they had been hastily dumped at the water’s edge, said Mom Sitha, chief of the municipal foreigner police unit.

“Both of the dead bodies are bruised and have small cuts. They were killed somewhere else and dumped last night in Prek Tasek commune,” Mr. Sitha said.

He said police had so far only concluded that the men were aged about 40 and 50, and that police believe they are either Chinese or Taiwanese.

The bodies were moved to the nearby Stung Meanchey pagoda where police conducted an autopsy to find out the cause of death, he said.

Russei Keo district police chief Iv Chhunheng said the autopsy found evidence the men were tortured at another location for some time before they died, with their bodies covered in bruising and swelling.

“We couldn’t find out their citizenship, because their clothes had no documentation inside the pockets. Our autopsy police are checking,” Mr. Chhunheng said.

Mr. Chhunheng said a local boy, who was cycling near the riverbank during the night, had seen a van park briefly while men un­loaded and dumped something by the river around 2:30 a.m. The men in the van had covered their faces so they could not be identified, according to the witness, he said.

Municipal minor crimes police chief Song Ly said that police were in touch with the officials of several different embassies in Phnom Penh to try to identify the bodies.

“Now, we are cooperating with the Chinese, the Koreans, Taiwanese and Japanese,” he said.

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