By Lauren Crothers

PHNOM PENH 

Nine more Montagnards have crossed the Vietnamese border into Cambodia and are now in hiding in the jungles there, bringing the number of the predominantly Christian asylum seekers in the country to 14, it was reported Monday.

The Cambodia Daily quoted Wan-Hea Lee - country director of the United Nations’ Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) - as saying Sunday that there is now an added sense of urgency with regard to their case.

“OHCHR is concerned about these recent reports of a new group of Montagnards having cross[ed] the border, including children, which adds to the urgency,” the Daily quoted Ms Lee as saying. “It is imperative that the Montagnards be given the chance to indicate whether they seek asylum.”

The OHCHR was instrumental in making contact with a previous group of 13 Montagnards who were hiding out in the jungles of Ratanakkiri, the same province this new group have fled to.

That group is now in Phnom Penh, and their applications for asylum are being assessed by Cambodia’s immigration department.

Two weeks ago, five Montagnards crossed the border and went into hiding, prompting local authorities to begin a search, but villagers in the area said they had been threatened over the asylum seekers’ whereabouts and were told they would be in trouble if they were found to be harboring any.

The Daily said there are three children among this latest group, and it quoted local ethnic Jarai villagers as saying that they had left Vietnam because they had been threatened by the authorities there.

Montagnards typically hail from that country’s Central Highland area, but have fled in large numbers for the past few years, citing discrimination and fear for their safety. They are a predominantly Christian people and their churches have been burned to the ground by officials in Vietnam.

Several attempts to reach Interior Ministry spokesman Lieutenant General Khieu Sopheak were unsuccessful.