CCHR | Cambodian Center for Human Rights

22/11 Justice Fund

On 22 November 2010, the last day of Cambodia’s annual Water Festival, hundreds of Cambodians were killed on Koh Pich Bridge in Phnom Penh in what is Cambodia’s worst ever peace time tragedy. Initial reports put the number of dead as high as 456, a number that since been reduced to 350 by the Royal Government of Cambodia in what is being described as a “human stampede”. Around 400 people were also injured.

The first rumours that spread through Phnom Penh on the night of 22 November were that the bridge had collapsed. The following morning, a doctor from Calmette hospital explained that a preliminary assessment of the causes of death among the victims he had examined were suffocation and electrocution, a suggestion that was subsequently rejected outright by government spokesmen and denied by Calmette officials notwithstanding statements by numerous victims that they had been electrocuted on the bridge. Within days, those affected by the tragedy started looking for answers; “we really need the explanation from the government,” said one man whose granddaughters, daughter and nieces had been injured in the tragedy. Another man, whose sister died on the bridge, expressed his anger at the tragedy and asked whether the “police really did their job? Why did they allow it to happen in the first place?”

But satisfactory answers to questions like these were never given, and the government quickly drew a line in the sand declaring that lessons had been learnt and that such an event would never be repeated. Spokesmen for a committee established to identify the causes of the tragedy have pointed the finger of blame at the people on the bridge on the night of 22 November 2010 explaining that many of the people were from the countryside and did not understand that suspension bridges sway. These people, it is said, panicked and started to run off the bridge causing the stampede. The same committee rejected outright any suggestion that people on the bridge that fateful night were electrocuted.

The failure to make adequate preparations for the millions of people that were expected in Phnom Penh over the Water Festival, the failure to effectively police the event and the speed with which the tragedy was pushed aside and forgotten by officials reflect wider problems in Cambodia of cronyism and the absence of accountability for wealthy and powerful individuals. The 22/11 Justice Fund was set up to support and facilitate calls by the families of those who died on the bridge, and by those who were injured that night, for justice and to help find answers to the questions the government did not adequately address or seek to find answers for.

Between December 2010 and February 2011, CCHR interviewed over a hundred people about the Koh Pich tragedy, including survivors, victim’s families, doctors and police. CCHR made radio appeals asking people across the country to provide information about the night to assist in providing a clearer picture of what happened. In March 2011, CCHR will publish a report setting out the findings of our interviews and comparing those findings to the findings of the government committee that was vested with the authority to investigate the causes of the tragedy on Koh Pich Bridge.

To support the 22/11 Justice Fund you can make donations to:  

For the local transfer: 
Bank Name: ACLEDA Bank Plc. 
Account Name: Cambodian Center for Human Rights  
Account Number: 2900-20-177 861-4-1   

For overseas transfer:
 Bank Name: ACLEDA Bank Plc.
 Account Name: Cambodian Center for Human Rights
 Account Number: 2900-20-177 861-4-1 
Bank Address: #61, Preah Monivong Blvd., Sangkat Srah Chork, Khan Daun Penh, Phnom Penh, Cambodia. 
Telephone Number: +855-23-994-444/ 15-999 233
 Fax Number: +855-23-430-555
E-mail : inquiry@acledabank.com.kh 
SWIFT : ACLBKHPP

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