March 11, 2025 Khmer Rouge

 

This is an extremely disturbing part of history in Cambodia and please be aware the contents may be too much for some to see.   I post it because I feel it is so important to face the past brutality in hopes it will eventually be stopped.   Human lives are precious and we all need to do what we can to stop genocide; brutality; cruelty - inhuman behavior by power hungry people!  Our guide, Rhy, saw his grandmother shot, his sister beaten, and his grandfather die of starvation because he gave all his food to his grandchildren to keep them alive.

The Khmer Rouge was  led by Pol Pot, Nuon Chea, Ieng Sary, Son Sen, and Khieu Samphan

The  regime murdered hundreds of thousands of their perceived political opponents, and their racist emphasis on national purity resulted in the genocide of Cambodian minorities. Its cadres  executed and tortured perceived subversive elements, or they killed them during genocidal purges of their own ranks between 1975 and 1978. Ultimately, the Cambodian genocide, which took place under the Khmer Rouge regime led to the deaths of 1.5 to 2 million people, around 25% of Cambodia's population.

We visited Tuel Sleng Genocide Museum (S-21) outside Phnom Penh.  This was a former secondary school that the Khmer Rouge took over as a prison camp.  They had different prisons around Cambodia hence the "S-21" to identify the prison.  From 1976 to 1979 there is believed to have been 20,000 people imprisoned here but the exact number is unknown. 

Above are the shackles used on prisoners.  Below:  They hung prisoners upside down putting their heads into the water jugs. 

These men were the only survivors of S-21 and only because they had experience that was helpful to the Khmer Rouge but they were still horribly tortured.

Below is Chum Mey, the first on the left in the picture above.  He wrote books telling his story about time in prison.  His skill as a mechanic saved him.  After 12 days and nights of beatings and repeated electrocution he was picked from among the other prisoners and put to work repairing typewriters that his tortures used to record their "forced" confessions. 

Below, Bou Meng, was also at the museum selling his book.  He is the smallest on the above picture of the survivors.  He is an artist and was only kept alive because he was put to work painting portraits of the Khmer Rouge leader, Pol Pot.  His wife and children killed at the Killing Fields.
 

                                                           Pictures of the people killed 

This woman had just given birth and had her head screwed to force her to sit up right and watch her baby being killed before they killed her.

Above is the woman's building.   One woman was brought back after being tortured and she committed  suicide by jumping off the top floor,  After that they put wire up so this was not possible any more. 

Next we were driven to The Killing Fields.  This place is in a remote area that had a Chinese Cemetery near by.  Khmer Rouge would transport prisoners in the middle of the night and execute them here.  After five years of researching 20,000 grave sites, analysis indicates at least 1,386,734 victims of execution. Estimates of total deaths resulting from Khmer Rouge policies, including from disease and starvation, range from 1.7 to 2.2 million, out of a 1975 population of roughly 8 million. 

 

The sharp edges of this plant were used as a saw in torture.

 

Mass Graves