A Thai court granted class action status to more than 700 Cambodian families suing Mitr Phol, a Thai sugar firm, for evicting them from their homes. Plaintiffs allege that they were forced off their land to make way for Mitr Phol's sugar plantation. According to plaintiffs their homes were burned and they were threatened with physical violence. The case will be Southeast Asia’s first transboundary class action into human rights abuses and the first class action filed in a Thai court by plaintiffs from another country against a Thai company for abuses that occurred outside of Thailand.