Mortar Kills Two Boys, Injures Third

Two boys were killed and another seriously injured when an abandoned mortar they were playing catch with blew up yesterday in Tbong Khmom province’s Memot district, according to police. District police officer Hang Sovann Mesa said the two boys aged six and 13 were killed instantly in the explosion, while the third, a 14-year-old, was rushed to the district hospital.

He said the boys had found the M2 60 milimeter mortar in an orchard a few days prior and had thrown it to each other like a ball with the unexploded ordnance remaining undetonated, the owner of the orchard told police. The three were not so lucky when they returned to the orchid yesterday to play a similar game with the mortar.

In May, an elderly man and his two grandchildren were killed after he accidentally detonated an artillery shell in Prey Veng province’s Preah Sdach district, after attempting to dismantle it to make parts for his bullock cart. An estimated 4-6 million landmines and other munitions left from decades of war and internal conflict continue to contaminate Cambodia, according to a Cambodian Mine Action Authority report from November of last year.

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