Three farmers in a village on the outskirts of Phnom Penh were hospitalised yesterday evening after being attacked by a 60-kilogram rampaging wild pig, a police official said.

Tien commune police chief Mil Eng told the Post that the attack occurred in a rice field near Sala village in the capital’s Dangkor district.

The three men were injured after the pig rammed into them, he said, leading to a chase involving about 100 villagers.

Khat Phorn, 32, sustained an injury to his left thigh, 33-year-old Rothat Bunanry was hit on his shins and their uncle, 56-year-old Kang Pheng, sustained back injuries. The three were carried from the rice field by neighbours and then sent to hospital, the officer said.

Victim Rothat Bunanry told the Post by telephone that the attack occurred while he and his neighbours were walking to their rice fields. He recalled seeing a large, grey pig emerge from a nearby forest.

“At first, I assumed that the pig belonged to someone in the village, but when we got closer it became startled,” he said. “Then it ran at me and attacked,” he recalled, explaining that because it was raining the ground was so slippery that it was impossible to run away quickly.

“My brother Phorn slipped off the embankment around the rice field and fell into the mud, and then uncle Phen rushed to help him. When Phen was kneeling down, the pig ploughed into his back, knocking him face first into the mud,” he said. “I yelled for help and grabbed a bamboo stick to hit the pig, but as I got closer it turned and came after me.”

Police chief Mil Eng said that by the time he and his colleagues arrived there were about 100 villagers chasing the pig around the field. He said the pig kept running in and out of the forest to evade the villagers, and that they kept slipping in the mud.

“We decided to shoot it dead,” Mil Eng said, adding that the officers later chopped it into sections and divided them among themselves.