Cambodian teens are camping out with a doomsday cult leader. Their parents want them to go home

Over 20,000 followers, including teens, turned up at a farmhouse after a politician-turned-doomsday prophet predicted the end of humanity on August 30

When his prediction failed, most supporters left but some parents continue to await their children’s return and have urged the government to intervene

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The cult group’s believers peel vegetables at the farmhouse. Photo: Facebook

Published: 4:44pm, 7 Sep 2022Updated: 5:25pm, 7 Sep 2022

Scores of parents in Cambodia have urged the government to help bring back their children camping at a farmhouse owned by a politician-turned-doomsday prophet amid concerns they had been indoctrinated.

Khem Veasna, head of the League for Democracy Party (LDP), claimed a devastating flood could wipe out humanity on August 30, and called on his supporters to take refuge at his mountainside plantation in Siem Reap province.

More than 20,000 followers, including teenagers and Cambodians working in Thailand and Japan, returned to Cambodia and flocked to the estate to escape the impending disaster.

Khem Veasna with his supporters at his farmhouse in Siem Reap province, Cambodia. Photo: Facebook

Veasna’s prediction, however, failed spectacularly. It prompted most of his adherents, who consider him to be Brahma, the Hindu god of creation, to leave the facility.

But worried parents said their children still had not returned home, despite officials ordering them to vacate the property over the weekend.

Authorities also accused Veasna of coaxing the youngsters to renounce their families and confining them to his countryside retreat.

Eam Voeun, who tried unsuccessfully to persuade his son to come home, said the latter had developed suicidal thoughts.