Cambodian police arrest 6 youths for gang-raping underage girl

Cambodian police have arrested six youths on the charge of gang-raping a 14-year-old girl in far Western Pailin province, a local police chief said Saturday. Lieutenant Colonel Chhorm Vanthy, police chief for serious crime office in Pailin, said the arrests came after the victim's mother filed a lawsuit against the six suspects aged between 15 and 23 years old. He said the suspects had lured the victim to drink alcohol until drunk and brought her to gang-rape at a graveyard late Thursday night and villagers found the victim unconscious on the following day. "We arrested the six suspects on Friday evening at their respective houses in the province," he said. "The suspects have confessed to gang-raping the girl when she got drunk." Chan Saveth, a senior investigator for rights group Adhoc, said Saturday that under the kingdom's law, the perpetrators could face jail terms ranging from five years to 15 years.