Police in Pursat province are on the hunt for the murderers of a 42-year-old man dogged by accusations of sorcery, officials said yesterday.

Theang Leng, Veal Veng district police chief, said that Neth Mouy, a farmer living in the district’s Krapeu Krom village, was murdered by at least two unidentified village residents on Saturday.

“He was stabbed with a knife in his back, his right ear, his short ribs and under his armpit. He was murdered when he went alone to bathe at a pond near his farm, about 3 kilometers from the village,” he said.

Leng said that, according to the victim’s family, Mouy was alone the day he was murdered, as his wife and five children had gone to attend a relative’s religious ceremony in the village.

“He was found dead by his wife and children at the pond at about 5pm on November 3,” he said, adding that the police investigation had turned up no quarrel with his neighbours.

“He was murdered because he had been known as a sorcerer.”

Leng said that Meas Mol, chief of the Veal Veng serious crimes police, reported that Mouy had been accused of using sorcery to make villagers sick, adding that six villagers had become seriously ill in the past month without apparent reason.

“Police are working hard in searching for the killers in order to bring them [in] to punish by law,” he said.

Grisly retribution has been exacted on numerous accused sorcerers in the past decade.

To contact the reporter on this story: Buth Reaksmey Kongkea at [email protected]