PHNOM PENH, March 17 (Xinhua) -- A boy was killed and his two younger sisters seriously wounded in a landmine explosion in northwest Cambodia's Oddar Meanchey province on Sunday, a mine clearance chief said.

Heng Ratana, director-general of the Cambodian Mine Action Center (CMAC), said the blast occurred Sunday morning in Anlong Veng district when the three siblings followed their mother to a cassava farm and the three kids played with a landmine.

"The children found the landmine and beat on it, triggering the explosion," Ratana wrote on social media.

"An eight-year-old boy was pronounced dead and his two younger sisters, aged four and five years old, sustained serious injuries in the accident," he said. "This is a tragedy of landmines and the remnants of war."

Cambodia is one of countries worst affected by landmines and remnants of war. An estimated 4 million to 6 million landmines and other munitions had been left over from three decades of war and internal conflicts that ended in 1998.

According to Yale University, between 1965 and 1973, the United States dropped some 230,516 bombs on 113,716 sites in the Southeast Asian country.

From 1979 to 2023, landmine and remnants of war explosions claimed 19,822 lives and either injured or amputated 45,215 others, according to an official report.

The kingdom is committed to getting rid of all types of landmines and remnants of war by 2025. Enditem

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