An illegal logger lost a foot to an anti-personnel mine in Preah Vihear province near the border with Thailand on Saturday while searching for rosewood.

Choam Ksan district deputy police chief Ruon Yeth said Chi Vorng, 23, a farmer from Rodos Srae village in Preah Vihear province, and four companions had ventured into the forests in the foothills surrounding the Dangrek Mountains to log rosewood.

According to Yeth, the group reached the Damnak Tatith path east of the An Ses checkpoint on the Thai-Cambodian border on Saturday afternoon, where Vorng stepped on the mine. His companions, who were uninjured, rushed him to the hospital on a tractor.

Yeth explained that the Dangrek mountains were the site of decades of fighting between the Khmer Rouge, government forces and other factions and remained dangerous and littered with mines. According to Yeth, one person died and two suffered injuries from mines in the district last year.