Grandparents collapsed on the trail from exhaustion. heatstroke. heart attacks. their wailing families huddled around them. with no water or shade to revive them. By the end of the day more than two hundred were dead and many more wounded. On April 3 the Vietnamese attacked the refugees loyal to Prince Sihanouk at OSmach. killing another three hundred and adding to the terror by pushing defenseless women and children into small bunkers and throwing hand grenades in after them. killing. blinding. and wounding a large number of refugees. Some of the wounded later crawled to the border. but an accurate accounting of the dead is impossible as long as a large force of Vietnamese tanks and artillery sits in the charred ruins of the refugee camp called Slhanouktown. The Vietnamese force was supported in the terror attack by some Cambodian troops from the Phnom Penh puppet army. this was seen as an added slap in the face of Prince Sihanouk. who was planning a visit to the camp. This recent round of attacks is also directed at Thai villages and military installations. The Vietnamese hoped to "teach the Thais a lesson." and push them away from the border. The Thai Air force took action near Sihanouktown when a force of five hundred Vietnamese soldiers entered Thailand to cut a vital road leading to OSmach in order to prevent relief groups from assisting the refugees. Many of the fleeing civilians were wandering in shock and fear through the forests and minefields. Five Thai soldiers were killed in the fighting. and more than a dozen were wounded.
Keywords matched
refugee refugees