Acid: a weapon close to hand

Mom Kunthear and Brooke Lewis

Phnom Penh Post

Kampong Cham Province
NEARLY three dec-ades after he suffered burns to his face and upper body in an acid attack, Orb Rath, 49, comes into contact with the corrosive liquid on an almost daily basis. Seven years ago, he took a job at the Chrab Rubber Plantation in Da commune, located in Kampong Cham province’s Memot district, where he mixes acid with rubber sap.

“I mix it on-site at the rubber plantation, and then bring the hard rubber to sell to a factory,” he said, and added that 100 litres of sap can be hardened with just 1 litre of diluted acid.

Accidents on the job, he said, are infrequent. “The rubber plantation director usually tells all workers to be careful when using acid, so rubber workers rarely get burned on the rubber plantation,” he said.

The problem, he said, is the easy availability of acid near the plantations, and the fact that it is sometimes used to resolve personal disputes. His own injuries, for instance, came at the hands of an aunt who had an argument with his mother, the subject of which has never been made clear to him.

“The attacks happen at people’s homes when they have violence or argue with each other, for instance like what happened to me,” he said.
The Cambodian Acid Survivors Charity (CASC) has also expressed concern that the concentration of rubber plantations in Kampong Cham – the province has more than any other – has led to an inordinate number of acid accidents and attacks there.

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