dkhmernews

Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Thanh Nien News (Hanoi)

A hailstorm on Sunday damaged power lines and blew away the roofs of hundreds of houses in the north-central provinces of Ha Tinh and Nghe An.
In Ha Tinh Province, two people were injured; and 687 houses and three schools in the districts of Thach Ha, Cam Xuyen and Ky Anh lost their roofs.

About 28 kilometers of power lines were devastated in Thach Ha District.

The hailstorm destroyed 90 hectares of rice paddies and 35 hectares of crops in the province, inflicting damages estimated at more than VND2.5 billion (US$141,000).

In Nghe An Province, nearly 200 houses were unroofed in Thanh Duc and Thanh Nho communes in Thanh Chuong District and Cao Son Commune in Anh Son District.

Dozens of electricity poles in these districts were broken, and hundreds of hectares of rice paddies and crops suffered serious damage.

The unpredictable weather Monday caused unseasonal rains in the south and is forecast to do the same today.

Le Thi Xuan Lan, an official of the weather bureau for the southern region, said Monday’s rains in Ho Chi Minh City and the provinces of Binh Duong, Binh Phuoc, Ca Mau and Kien Giang came from convection clouds that had been formed by hot weather in the area.

She said the phenomenon will spread to more areas in the south tomorrow, including HCMC and the provinces of Binh Phuoc, Dong Nai and Tay Ninh; the coastal provinces and partially on areas bordering Cambodia.

The center also warned of possible storms and lightning in the coming days.

However, temperatures are expected to increase slightly in the south, with southeastern provinces expected to experience a peak of 37 degrees Celsius.

Reported by Mai Vong – Khanh Hoan

Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Thanh Nien News (Hanoi)

A hailstorm on Sunday damaged power lines and blew away the roofs of hundreds of houses in the north-central provinces of Ha Tinh and Nghe An.
In Ha Tinh Province, two people were injured; and 687 houses and three schools in the districts of Thach Ha, Cam Xuyen and Ky Anh lost their roofs.

About 28 kilometers of power lines were devastated in Thach Ha District.

The hailstorm destroyed 90 hectares of rice paddies and 35 hectares of crops in the province, inflicting damages estimated at more than VND2.5 billion (US$141,000).

In Nghe An Province, nearly 200 houses were unroofed in Thanh Duc and Thanh Nho communes in Thanh Chuong District and Cao Son Commune in Anh Son District.

Dozens of electricity poles in these districts were broken, and hundreds of hectares of rice paddies and crops suffered serious damage.

The unpredictable weather Monday caused unseasonal rains in the south and is forecast to do the same today.

Le Thi Xuan Lan, an official of the weather bureau for the southern region, said Monday’s rains in Ho Chi Minh City and the provinces of Binh Duong, Binh Phuoc, Ca Mau and Kien Giang came from convection clouds that had been formed by hot weather in the area.

She said the phenomenon will spread to more areas in the south tomorrow, including HCMC and the provinces of Binh Phuoc, Dong Nai and Tay Ninh; the coastal provinces and partially on areas bordering Cambodia.

The center also warned of possible storms and lightning in the coming days.

However, temperatures are expected to increase slightly in the south, with southeastern provinces expected to experience a peak of 37 degrees Celsius.

Reported by Mai Vong – Khanh Hoan

30 March 2009
By Ky Soklim and Adrien le Gal
Cambodge Soir Hebdo
Translated from French by Luc Sâr
Click here to read the article in French

According to the Cambodian defense lawyer of the former S-21 boss whose trial is opening on Monday 20 March, it is “impossible” that a sentence could be handed down to his client.

Cambodge Soir Hebdo: How is your client feeling?

Kar Savuth: When his trial started, Duch was very happy and he was not worried at all. He knows that if the tribunal is fair, he will be freed because he is not part of the high-ranking KR officials who should be the only ones to be tried by the KR Tribunal (KRT).Is there still an uncertainty on the sentence that will be handed over to him?

It is possible that there will be sentence. It’s the law. Duch should not be in jail. He did not want to be the chief [of S-21], he wanted to do something else, but he was not allowed to. He told me clearly that he never wanted to be in charge of this place where people were being killed. Who wants to kill human beings? No one! But, what could he do? If he refused to obey the orders, he would have been killed also.

The civil parties want to re-open the investigation to determine if Duch was involved in forced marriages…

It’s too late, the investigations are closed. In any case, forced marriages were done everywhere under the KR regime. They should not accuse Duch who is only obeying his bosses.

You fought so that Duch is not charged with “participation in joint criminal enterprise”…

This charge is not right. In any case, there were 196 jails in the country. It is unfair to accuse Duch. In his center, 12,381 people died, whereas in other jails, more than 150,000 died… We seek justice. Duch is a scapegoat, others who killed are still roaming free.

You were Hun Sen’s lawyer… How do you get along with François Roux who, in France, defends civil disobedience followers?

François Roux and I, we have the same strategy. But, it is wrong to say that I defend only people close to power. I am interested in important affairs, and I defended the KR since 1982. Duch must have heard about me, and that’s why he chose me. The other people charged were also interested [in me], but we can only defend one of the accused.

As Cambodian, do you consider yourself a victim of the KR regime?

Yes, I am victim. But, I don’t have a grudge against Duch, nor the other four who were charged. I am not angry against the minor officials, I am angry against those who issued orders, i.e. Pol Pot. The others were only following orders.

30 March 2009
By Ky Soklim and Adrien le Gal
Cambodge Soir Hebdo
Translated from French by Luc Sâr
Click here to read the article in French

According to the Cambodian defense lawyer of the former S-21 boss whose trial is opening on Monday 20 March, it is “impossible” that a sentence could be handed down to his client.

Cambodge Soir Hebdo: How is your client feeling?

Kar Savuth: When his trial started, Duch was very happy and he was not worried at all. He knows that if the tribunal is fair, he will be freed because he is not part of the high-ranking KR officials who should be the only ones to be tried by the KR Tribunal (KRT).Is there still an uncertainty on the sentence that will be handed over to him?

It is possible that there will be sentence. It’s the law. Duch should not be in jail. He did not want to be the chief [of S-21], he wanted to do something else, but he was not allowed to. He told me clearly that he never wanted to be in charge of this place where people were being killed. Who wants to kill human beings? No one! But, what could he do? If he refused to obey the orders, he would have been killed also.

The civil parties want to re-open the investigation to determine if Duch was involved in forced marriages…

It’s too late, the investigations are closed. In any case, forced marriages were done everywhere under the KR regime. They should not accuse Duch who is only obeying his bosses.

You fought so that Duch is not charged with “participation in joint criminal enterprise”…

This charge is not right. In any case, there were 196 jails in the country. It is unfair to accuse Duch. In his center, 12,381 people died, whereas in other jails, more than 150,000 died… We seek justice. Duch is a scapegoat, others who killed are still roaming free.

You were Hun Sen’s lawyer… How do you get along with François Roux who, in France, defends civil disobedience followers?

François Roux and I, we have the same strategy. But, it is wrong to say that I defend only people close to power. I am interested in important affairs, and I defended the KR since 1982. Duch must have heard about me, and that’s why he chose me. The other people charged were also interested [in me], but we can only defend one of the accused.

As Cambodian, do you consider yourself a victim of the KR regime?

Yes, I am victim. But, I don’t have a grudge against Duch, nor the other four who were charged. I am not angry against the minor officials, I am angry against those who issued orders, i.e. Pol Pot. The others were only following orders.

30 March 2009
AFP

PHNOM PENH : The Khmer Rouge regime's prison chief finally stood trial on Monday for Cambodia's "Killing Fields" atrocities, accused of overseeing the torture and execution of 15,000 people three decades ago.
Former teacher Kaing Guek Eav -- better known as Duch -- appeared before a UN-backed war crimes court set up to deal with senior members of the 1975-1979 communist movement which killed up to two million people.

Wearing a white striped shirt, the frail 66-year-old heard charges that prisoners at the notorious Tuol Sleng prison he ran were subjected to beatings, suffocation and electrocution before being killed.

"I have already been notified of the charges against me," Duch told the court in response to initial questions, after greeting judges in the traditional Cambodian manner of putting his hands together.

"Before I was arrested by the military court, I was a teacher."

Duch sat in the dock while a clerk read the order charging him with war crimes, crimes against humanity, premediated murder and torture relating to his time as head of Tuol Sleng, also known as S21.

He faces life in prison if found guilty.

"Several witnesses said Duch was feared by everyone at S21. He enforced both the general rules of the (Khmer Rouge) in relation to the security police, as well as strict rules which he devised for the operation of S21," the clerk said.

"In addition to executing prisoners condemned in advance as traitors, an overriding purpose of S21 was to extract confessions from prisoners in order to uncover further networks as possible traitors."

The clerk said Duch permitted his staff to use torture techniques including beatings, electrocutions, placing plastic bags over prisoners' heads or pouring water into their noses.

Prosecutors and defence lawyers will make their opening statements for the trial on Tuesday and Duch is expected to apologise in court later this week. The trial is expected to last several months.

"It's certain that he will use the opportunity given to him to speak to the judges, to the victims and, beyond that, with the Cambodian population," Duch's French lawyer Francois Roux told AFP.

But many of the hundreds of Khmer Rouge survivors who watched the hearing behind bulletproof glass in an auditorium appeared reluctant to forgive the past.

"I am angry because they killed my wife, and I am happy because I have the court to try Khmer Rouge leaders," said Bou Meng, one of the handful of people who survived Tuol Sleng because his artistic skills were useful to the regime.

Duch, who became a born-again Christian while in hiding in the 1990s, previously told investigators that the decision to arrest people and send them to Tuol Sleng was made by the Khmer Rouge central committee.

He also denies personally torturing or executing prisoners, although he has consistently accepted responsibility for the atrocities at Tuol Sleng.

Many Cambodians believe the controversial tribunal, established in 2006 after nearly a decade of negotiations between Cambodia and the United Nations, is the last chance to find justice for the Khmer Rouge's crimes.

The joint trial of four other leaders of the 1975-1979 regime is set to start later this year after Duch's trial is completed, although no date has yet been set.

Tuol Sleng was at the heart of the Khmer Rouge's security apparatus and thousands of inmates were taken from there during Duch's tenure for execution at nearby Choeung Ek, an orchard now known as the "Killing Fields."

Many were allegedly forced to confess that they were spies for the US Central Intelligence Agency, the Soviet KGB or for neighbouring Vietnam.

Led by Pol Pot, the Khmer Rouge wiped out nearly a quarter of the population through starvation, overwork and execution as they tried to take society back to a rural "Year Zero" in a tragic spin-off to the Vietnam War.

Pol Pot died in 1998.

Duch has been detained since 1999, when he was found working as a Christian aid worker in the jungle, and was formally arrested by the tribunal in July 2007. He was indicted last year.

30 March 2009
AFP

PHNOM PENH : The Khmer Rouge regime's prison chief finally stood trial on Monday for Cambodia's "Killing Fields" atrocities, accused of overseeing the torture and execution of 15,000 people three decades ago.
Former teacher Kaing Guek Eav -- better known as Duch -- appeared before a UN-backed war crimes court set up to deal with senior members of the 1975-1979 communist movement which killed up to two million people.

Wearing a white striped shirt, the frail 66-year-old heard charges that prisoners at the notorious Tuol Sleng prison he ran were subjected to beatings, suffocation and electrocution before being killed.

"I have already been notified of the charges against me," Duch told the court in response to initial questions, after greeting judges in the traditional Cambodian manner of putting his hands together.

"Before I was arrested by the military court, I was a teacher."

Duch sat in the dock while a clerk read the order charging him with war crimes, crimes against humanity, premediated murder and torture relating to his time as head of Tuol Sleng, also known as S21.

He faces life in prison if found guilty.

"Several witnesses said Duch was feared by everyone at S21. He enforced both the general rules of the (Khmer Rouge) in relation to the security police, as well as strict rules which he devised for the operation of S21," the clerk said.

"In addition to executing prisoners condemned in advance as traitors, an overriding purpose of S21 was to extract confessions from prisoners in order to uncover further networks as possible traitors."

The clerk said Duch permitted his staff to use torture techniques including beatings, electrocutions, placing plastic bags over prisoners' heads or pouring water into their noses.

Prosecutors and defence lawyers will make their opening statements for the trial on Tuesday and Duch is expected to apologise in court later this week. The trial is expected to last several months.

"It's certain that he will use the opportunity given to him to speak to the judges, to the victims and, beyond that, with the Cambodian population," Duch's French lawyer Francois Roux told AFP.

But many of the hundreds of Khmer Rouge survivors who watched the hearing behind bulletproof glass in an auditorium appeared reluctant to forgive the past.

"I am angry because they killed my wife, and I am happy because I have the court to try Khmer Rouge leaders," said Bou Meng, one of the handful of people who survived Tuol Sleng because his artistic skills were useful to the regime.

Duch, who became a born-again Christian while in hiding in the 1990s, previously told investigators that the decision to arrest people and send them to Tuol Sleng was made by the Khmer Rouge central committee.

He also denies personally torturing or executing prisoners, although he has consistently accepted responsibility for the atrocities at Tuol Sleng.

Many Cambodians believe the controversial tribunal, established in 2006 after nearly a decade of negotiations between Cambodia and the United Nations, is the last chance to find justice for the Khmer Rouge's crimes.

The joint trial of four other leaders of the 1975-1979 regime is set to start later this year after Duch's trial is completed, although no date has yet been set.

Tuol Sleng was at the heart of the Khmer Rouge's security apparatus and thousands of inmates were taken from there during Duch's tenure for execution at nearby Choeung Ek, an orchard now known as the "Killing Fields."

Many were allegedly forced to confess that they were spies for the US Central Intelligence Agency, the Soviet KGB or for neighbouring Vietnam.

Led by Pol Pot, the Khmer Rouge wiped out nearly a quarter of the population through starvation, overwork and execution as they tried to take society back to a rural "Year Zero" in a tragic spin-off to the Vietnam War.

Pol Pot died in 1998.

Duch has been detained since 1999, when he was found working as a Christian aid worker in the jungle, and was formally arrested by the tribunal in July 2007. He was indicted last year.

Sat, Mar. 28, 2009
By DENIS D. GRAY
Associated Press Writer

Just as the chief Khmer Rouge torturer takes the stand before a United Nations-backed genocide tribunal, a mausoleum fit for a king will be unveiled for another murderous leader from the same regime.

The entombed Ta Mok, known to his victims as "The Butcher," remains a revered figure in Anlong Veng because practically everyone here - from the district chief to the tourism promoter, from the wealthiest businessmen to dirt-poor farmers - was once Khmer Rouge.

This remote, rough-and-ready town is no aberration. Thirty years after the fall of their Maoist regime, former Khmer Rouge officials still run extensive enclaves across northwestern and northern Cambodia. After Anlong Veng, their last holdout, fell in 1998, Khmer Rouge officials abandoned their savage policies and took posts in the new power structure.

They appear unlikely to face justice for alleged crimes during a brutal 1975-1979 reign of terror under which some 2 million died.

"We were the former Khmer Rouge commanders so we knew the area and the people, so after we surrendered we were confident we would get similar positions - in the government, police, the military," explains Pery Saroen, 55, Anlong Veng's deputy district chief, whose superior is also a one-star army general. "When we handed over ourselves, our territory, we became part of the government. We had an agreement with the government and we knew they would forgive us."

An equivalent scenario would have been known Nazi officials and military commanders, some with blood on their hands, serving in 1975 as West Germany's mayors and ministers amid war crimes trials for their leaders.

Only five are expected to face trial. The first, Kaing Guek Eav - better known as Comrade Duch - headed Phnom Penh's notorious S-21 torture center. He is scheduled to testify at the end of the month before a joint international and Cambodian tribunal.

"It's clear that not every Khmer Rouge cadre who carried out killings and crimes is going to come before the tribunal. We don't believe it should stop at the top five most notorious figures. We could do more to bring justice to Cambodians," says Sara Colm of the New York-based Human Rights Watch, echoing criticism of many Cambodians and foreign prosecutors.

Nhem Sarath, with the non-governmental Cambodian Human Rights and Development Association, says villagers outside Khmer Rouge areas often ask why the court doesn't try the many Khmer Rouge suspected of atrocities.

"They also ask us why the powerful leaders now running the country are also not arrested," he says.

Prime Minister Hun Sen, Senate President Chea Sim and National Assembly Chairman Heng Samrin were all Khmer Rouge commanders or officials, and now are unchallenged in their power. Other top positions are filled by their one-time comrades, including Foreign Minister Hor Nam Hong and deputy prime ministers Men Sam On and Keat Chhun, who also holds the finance and economy portfolio.

Although no evidence has come to light implicating Hun Sen, a division commander, in Khmer Rouge crimes, he has sought to narrowly restrict those brought to justice because a number in his government and party are hiding skeletons in their closets.

Among the most notorious is Meah Mut, an ex-Khmer Rouge military official, who is on a prosecution "hit list" of at least five others they want to try. A brigadier general and adviser to the Defense Ministry, he lives in a lovely house amid a fruit orchard in Samlot, about 125 miles from Anlong Veng, in the northwest.

It was to this region that the Khmer Rouge leaders and thousands of followers fled when a Vietnamese invasion force toppled their regime in 1979. While Khmer Rouge in other areas of the country sought to quietly merge back into society, those in the northwest melted into the jungles and mountains to wage guerrilla war until the guns fell silent through an amnesty in 1998, the year Anlong Veng fell, and their leader, Pol Pot, died. All ex-Khmer Rouge in the region express loyalty to Hun Sen and his Cambodian People's Party.

David Chandler, a leading Cambodia historian due to appear as an expert witness at the tribunal, says the deal has proved a "standoff, a trade-off that suits both sides."

"They are not going into dissidence or to secede. They have to behave to a certain extent but Hun Sen is not going to mess with them too much," he says. "I don't think these are dedicated left-wing thinkers or performers. I think they abandoned that and got into the money and the patronage situation and are perfectly happy."

Many of the former Khmer Rouge claim to support the trial of their one-time leaders.

"To be honest, when ex-Khmer Rouge heard that the top five leaders would be tried, they said, 'We don't mind. Let's do it,'" said Nhem En, another district deputy head who was S-21's chief photographer and, like most former Khmer Rouge, points a finger at the leaders while denying any wrongdoing himself.

Ta Mok, who died a prisoner in 2006, is still much admired in Anlong Veng. His mausoleum, copied from ancient Angkorian temples by his rich grandson, will be completed almost to the day that Duch testifies.

"We regarded Ta Mok like a father who takes care of his children. He imposed restrictions and discipline but he gave us food, clothing, places to live," recalls Chat Chay, a poor laborer and former Khmer Rouge soldier. He noted how Ta Mok, whose cruelty was legendary, built roads, a hospital, a bridge and a high school building.

The town's 3,000 schoolchildren are taught nothing about their country's Khmer Rouge past, and only a few posters about the trial have been put around school grounds, says elementary school Vice Principal Reak Smey. He is one of a sizable influx of non-Khmer Rouge from other parts of the country, drawn by the possibility of acquiring land in the sparsely populated area and earning income from a lucrative cross-border trade with nearby Thailand.

"When I first arrived I was worried about having to adapt to life with former Khmer Rouge, but after a few months I discovered their honesty and kindness. The more I lived with them, the better I felt," he says, recalling that the revolutionaries had tried to instill rigid morality, albeit at the point of a gun, during their years in power. Now, he says, their virtues are being eroded by the influence of the newcomers.

Khieu Dum is a wealthy 36-year-old who owns a gas station and money exchange business. He is also the son of Khieu Samphan, who faces charges of crimes against humanity during his time as the Khmer Rouge president. An expensive Lexus sports utility vehicle sits in the son's garage at the dusty crossroads of this district of about 20,000, where the new settlers have had to be friendly because they are the powerless outsiders.

"This is a small and simple place. People just go about their business. The old (Khmer Rouge) people and the newcomers live together amiably. I have never had trouble because of my father," says Khieu Dum.

The Khmer Rouge leaders were off to a head start when the amnesty came, having amassed mini-fortunes during their days as guerrillas through smuggling of timber, gems and antiques to Thailand. Now, the upper echelons own some of the poshest houses and cars in the provinces of Pailin, Preah Vihear, Battambang, Banteay Meanchey and Oddar Meancheay - Cambodia's Khmer Rouge country.

Some have sunk into gross corruption and engage in activities, like gambling, which would have earned them summary execution in the old days. And they have certainly ditched their ideal of a classless society.

In Anlong Veng, a two-class system appears to have emerged: the rich businessmen and government officials living in town and former low-ranking soldiers who barely survive on arid land they don't own in the surrounding countryside. Thus the town witnessed both the final military defeat of the Khmer Rouge and the death of its ideals.

Chat Chay says he joined the movement as a 14-year-old after the Khmer Rouge persuaded him they would liberate the country and create a utopia of neither rich nor poor. Now, he breaks up stones at construction sites, able to use only his right hand since a head wound paralyzed his left side. He earns less than one dollar a day for his family of seven.

"The Khmer Rouge didn't do what they promised. They changed their policies," says the 51-year-old man. "I was wounded but the Khmer Rouge gave me nothing and I have also received nothing from this government."

Sat, Mar. 28, 2009
By DENIS D. GRAY
Associated Press Writer

Just as the chief Khmer Rouge torturer takes the stand before a United Nations-backed genocide tribunal, a mausoleum fit for a king will be unveiled for another murderous leader from the same regime.

The entombed Ta Mok, known to his victims as "The Butcher," remains a revered figure in Anlong Veng because practically everyone here - from the district chief to the tourism promoter, from the wealthiest businessmen to dirt-poor farmers - was once Khmer Rouge.

This remote, rough-and-ready town is no aberration. Thirty years after the fall of their Maoist regime, former Khmer Rouge officials still run extensive enclaves across northwestern and northern Cambodia. After Anlong Veng, their last holdout, fell in 1998, Khmer Rouge officials abandoned their savage policies and took posts in the new power structure.

They appear unlikely to face justice for alleged crimes during a brutal 1975-1979 reign of terror under which some 2 million died.

"We were the former Khmer Rouge commanders so we knew the area and the people, so after we surrendered we were confident we would get similar positions - in the government, police, the military," explains Pery Saroen, 55, Anlong Veng's deputy district chief, whose superior is also a one-star army general. "When we handed over ourselves, our territory, we became part of the government. We had an agreement with the government and we knew they would forgive us."

An equivalent scenario would have been known Nazi officials and military commanders, some with blood on their hands, serving in 1975 as West Germany's mayors and ministers amid war crimes trials for their leaders.

Only five are expected to face trial. The first, Kaing Guek Eav - better known as Comrade Duch - headed Phnom Penh's notorious S-21 torture center. He is scheduled to testify at the end of the month before a joint international and Cambodian tribunal.

"It's clear that not every Khmer Rouge cadre who carried out killings and crimes is going to come before the tribunal. We don't believe it should stop at the top five most notorious figures. We could do more to bring justice to Cambodians," says Sara Colm of the New York-based Human Rights Watch, echoing criticism of many Cambodians and foreign prosecutors.

Nhem Sarath, with the non-governmental Cambodian Human Rights and Development Association, says villagers outside Khmer Rouge areas often ask why the court doesn't try the many Khmer Rouge suspected of atrocities.

"They also ask us why the powerful leaders now running the country are also not arrested," he says.

Prime Minister Hun Sen, Senate President Chea Sim and National Assembly Chairman Heng Samrin were all Khmer Rouge commanders or officials, and now are unchallenged in their power. Other top positions are filled by their one-time comrades, including Foreign Minister Hor Nam Hong and deputy prime ministers Men Sam On and Keat Chhun, who also holds the finance and economy portfolio.

Although no evidence has come to light implicating Hun Sen, a division commander, in Khmer Rouge crimes, he has sought to narrowly restrict those brought to justice because a number in his government and party are hiding skeletons in their closets.

Among the most notorious is Meah Mut, an ex-Khmer Rouge military official, who is on a prosecution "hit list" of at least five others they want to try. A brigadier general and adviser to the Defense Ministry, he lives in a lovely house amid a fruit orchard in Samlot, about 125 miles from Anlong Veng, in the northwest.

It was to this region that the Khmer Rouge leaders and thousands of followers fled when a Vietnamese invasion force toppled their regime in 1979. While Khmer Rouge in other areas of the country sought to quietly merge back into society, those in the northwest melted into the jungles and mountains to wage guerrilla war until the guns fell silent through an amnesty in 1998, the year Anlong Veng fell, and their leader, Pol Pot, died. All ex-Khmer Rouge in the region express loyalty to Hun Sen and his Cambodian People's Party.

David Chandler, a leading Cambodia historian due to appear as an expert witness at the tribunal, says the deal has proved a "standoff, a trade-off that suits both sides."

"They are not going into dissidence or to secede. They have to behave to a certain extent but Hun Sen is not going to mess with them too much," he says. "I don't think these are dedicated left-wing thinkers or performers. I think they abandoned that and got into the money and the patronage situation and are perfectly happy."

Many of the former Khmer Rouge claim to support the trial of their one-time leaders.

"To be honest, when ex-Khmer Rouge heard that the top five leaders would be tried, they said, 'We don't mind. Let's do it,'" said Nhem En, another district deputy head who was S-21's chief photographer and, like most former Khmer Rouge, points a finger at the leaders while denying any wrongdoing himself.

Ta Mok, who died a prisoner in 2006, is still much admired in Anlong Veng. His mausoleum, copied from ancient Angkorian temples by his rich grandson, will be completed almost to the day that Duch testifies.

"We regarded Ta Mok like a father who takes care of his children. He imposed restrictions and discipline but he gave us food, clothing, places to live," recalls Chat Chay, a poor laborer and former Khmer Rouge soldier. He noted how Ta Mok, whose cruelty was legendary, built roads, a hospital, a bridge and a high school building.

The town's 3,000 schoolchildren are taught nothing about their country's Khmer Rouge past, and only a few posters about the trial have been put around school grounds, says elementary school Vice Principal Reak Smey. He is one of a sizable influx of non-Khmer Rouge from other parts of the country, drawn by the possibility of acquiring land in the sparsely populated area and earning income from a lucrative cross-border trade with nearby Thailand.

"When I first arrived I was worried about having to adapt to life with former Khmer Rouge, but after a few months I discovered their honesty and kindness. The more I lived with them, the better I felt," he says, recalling that the revolutionaries had tried to instill rigid morality, albeit at the point of a gun, during their years in power. Now, he says, their virtues are being eroded by the influence of the newcomers.

Khieu Dum is a wealthy 36-year-old who owns a gas station and money exchange business. He is also the son of Khieu Samphan, who faces charges of crimes against humanity during his time as the Khmer Rouge president. An expensive Lexus sports utility vehicle sits in the son's garage at the dusty crossroads of this district of about 20,000, where the new settlers have had to be friendly because they are the powerless outsiders.

"This is a small and simple place. People just go about their business. The old (Khmer Rouge) people and the newcomers live together amiably. I have never had trouble because of my father," says Khieu Dum.

The Khmer Rouge leaders were off to a head start when the amnesty came, having amassed mini-fortunes during their days as guerrillas through smuggling of timber, gems and antiques to Thailand. Now, the upper echelons own some of the poshest houses and cars in the provinces of Pailin, Preah Vihear, Battambang, Banteay Meanchey and Oddar Meancheay - Cambodia's Khmer Rouge country.

Some have sunk into gross corruption and engage in activities, like gambling, which would have earned them summary execution in the old days. And they have certainly ditched their ideal of a classless society.

In Anlong Veng, a two-class system appears to have emerged: the rich businessmen and government officials living in town and former low-ranking soldiers who barely survive on arid land they don't own in the surrounding countryside. Thus the town witnessed both the final military defeat of the Khmer Rouge and the death of its ideals.

Chat Chay says he joined the movement as a 14-year-old after the Khmer Rouge persuaded him they would liberate the country and create a utopia of neither rich nor poor. Now, he breaks up stones at construction sites, able to use only his right hand since a head wound paralyzed his left side. He earns less than one dollar a day for his family of seven.

"The Khmer Rouge didn't do what they promised. They changed their policies," says the 51-year-old man. "I was wounded but the Khmer Rouge gave me nothing and I have also received nothing from this government."

Veasna Neary Kam-kor Kat Dé - "Sad fate of garment factory workers": A Poem in Khmer by Sam Vichea

Click on the poem to zoom in

Poem in Khmer by Sam Vichea (on the web at http://kamnapkumnou.blogspot.com)

Click on the poem to zoom in

Poem in Khmer by Mrs. Diep Champa

Friday, 27 March 2009
Written by Soeun Say
The Phnom Penh Post

Shopping malls and supermarkets report drop in sales of between 20 percent to 50 percent as Phnom Penh's consumers feel the pinch.
SHOPPING in supermarkets and malls - a fairly recent trend in the Kingdom - has dropped off, with the economic downturn forcing consumers to cut back on spending, Phnom Penh's major outlets said this week.

Four of the city's main shopping centres have reported that sales have plummeted since the beginning of the year.

Sales at Sovanna Mall have been reduced by half, said That Rithy, a representative of the store.

Svanna Mall opened in July last year and pulled strong sales until the end of 2008. But the subsequent onset of the effects of the global economic crisis has hit sales, he said.

Pencil Supermarket General Manager Svay Sovann Ratana's said sales at his store have dropped 20 percent.

The country's marquee mall, Sorya, located in the heart of Phnom Penh, has seen a 25 percent drop in sales, according to its general manager, Lam Sopheap.

"Customers have less cash to spend since the financial crisis forced their incomes down," he said.

Food sales had remained relatively stable, while consumers were acquiring fewer nonessential items like electronics, he added.

"I keep spending on food, but I won't spend on things that are not important," said Pen Rechana, 37, an independent land speculator shopping Thursday in Sorya.

2007 and 2008 were boom years for business, she said, but the dropoff in the real-estate sector had hit her personal finances, she added.

Sorya and Sovanna have tried to keep retailers operating in their retail units by offering reduced power costs, they said.

But for retailers, the slight reduction in operating costs has been far outpaced by a much steeper decline in retail sales. "It has become very quiet," said Touch Sotheara, who runs a shoe shop in Sydney Shopping Centre.

Staff reported a 30 percent decline in sales at Sydney since the turn of the year.

"Customers come just to look; they don't buy as often as they did last year," he added. "Last year I earned between US$1,000 and $1,500 a month. Now it's more like $500 [a month]."

Cambodia has seen a downturn in a number of key sectors in recent months, leading to increasingly low GDP growth forecasts for this year.

The Asian Development Bank is due to revise its prediction for 2009 downwards next week.

Friday, 27 March 2009
Written by Soeun Say
The Phnom Penh Post

Shopping malls and supermarkets report drop in sales of between 20 percent to 50 percent as Phnom Penh's consumers feel the pinch.
SHOPPING in supermarkets and malls - a fairly recent trend in the Kingdom - has dropped off, with the economic downturn forcing consumers to cut back on spending, Phnom Penh's major outlets said this week.

Four of the city's main shopping centres have reported that sales have plummeted since the beginning of the year.

Sales at Sovanna Mall have been reduced by half, said That Rithy, a representative of the store.

Svanna Mall opened in July last year and pulled strong sales until the end of 2008. But the subsequent onset of the effects of the global economic crisis has hit sales, he said.

Pencil Supermarket General Manager Svay Sovann Ratana's said sales at his store have dropped 20 percent.

The country's marquee mall, Sorya, located in the heart of Phnom Penh, has seen a 25 percent drop in sales, according to its general manager, Lam Sopheap.

"Customers have less cash to spend since the financial crisis forced their incomes down," he said.

Food sales had remained relatively stable, while consumers were acquiring fewer nonessential items like electronics, he added.

"I keep spending on food, but I won't spend on things that are not important," said Pen Rechana, 37, an independent land speculator shopping Thursday in Sorya.

2007 and 2008 were boom years for business, she said, but the dropoff in the real-estate sector had hit her personal finances, she added.

Sorya and Sovanna have tried to keep retailers operating in their retail units by offering reduced power costs, they said.

But for retailers, the slight reduction in operating costs has been far outpaced by a much steeper decline in retail sales. "It has become very quiet," said Touch Sotheara, who runs a shoe shop in Sydney Shopping Centre.

Staff reported a 30 percent decline in sales at Sydney since the turn of the year.

"Customers come just to look; they don't buy as often as they did last year," he added. "Last year I earned between US$1,000 and $1,500 a month. Now it's more like $500 [a month]."

Cambodia has seen a downturn in a number of key sectors in recent months, leading to increasingly low GDP growth forecasts for this year.

The Asian Development Bank is due to revise its prediction for 2009 downwards next week.

03/28/2009
AP

ANLONG VENG, Cambodia — He was one of the greatest mass killers of the 20th century, but that doesn't stop the hopeful from praying at Pol Pot's hillside grave for lucky lottery numbers, job promotions and beautiful brides.Nor does it stop tourists from picking clean the bones and ashes from the Khmer Rouge leader's burial ground in this remote town in northwestern Cambodia.

The grave is among a slew of Khmer Rouge landmarks in Anlong Veng, where the movement's guerrillas made their last stand in 1998 just as Pol Pot lay dying. A $1 million tourism master plan is being finalized to preserve and protect 15 of the sites, and charge admission.

Included on the tour will be the houses and hideouts of the Khmer Rouge leaders, an execution site and places associated with Ta Mok, a brutal commander and Anlong Veng's last boss.

"People want to see the last stronghold of the Khmer Rouge and places where they committed atrocities," says Seang Sokheng, who heads the district tourism office and himself an ex-Khmer Rouge soldier.

Anlong Veng, he says, now receives about 2,000 Cambodian and 60 foreign tourists each month — a number that should jump when a casino is built by tycoons from nearby Thailand. A museum is also in the works, spearheaded by Nhem En, the chief photographer of the Khmer Rouge's S-21 torture center in Phnom Penh, a major tourist attraction for years.

"There are museums about World War II in Europe and people are still interested in Hitler. Why not about one of the world's most infamous leaders?" says Nhem En, now the deputy chief of Anlong Veng district. The museum will include his extensive photo collection and even a rice field to show visitors how people slaved under Khmer Rouge guns during their mid-1970s reign of terror.

Like virtually everyone here, he says he took no part in the atrocities but blames the top leaders.

"Pol Pot was cremated here. Please help to preserve this historical site," reads a sign next to a mound demarcated by bottles stuck into the ground and protected by a rusting, corrugated iron roof. A few wilting flowers sprout around the unguarded grave site, which officials complain has been virtually stripped of Pol Pot's cremated remains by foreign tourists.

"People come here, especially on holy days, because they believe Pol Pot's spirit is powerful," says Tith Ponlok, who served as the leader's bodyguard and lives near the burial ground.

Cambodians in the area, he says, have won an unusual number of lotteries, prompting Thais to come across the border and beseech Pol Pot to reveal winning numbers in their dreams. Government officials from Phnom Penh and others also make the pilgrimage, asking his spirit to make assorted wishes come true.

03/28/2009
AP

ANLONG VENG, Cambodia — He was one of the greatest mass killers of the 20th century, but that doesn't stop the hopeful from praying at Pol Pot's hillside grave for lucky lottery numbers, job promotions and beautiful brides.Nor does it stop tourists from picking clean the bones and ashes from the Khmer Rouge leader's burial ground in this remote town in northwestern Cambodia.

The grave is among a slew of Khmer Rouge landmarks in Anlong Veng, where the movement's guerrillas made their last stand in 1998 just as Pol Pot lay dying. A $1 million tourism master plan is being finalized to preserve and protect 15 of the sites, and charge admission.

Included on the tour will be the houses and hideouts of the Khmer Rouge leaders, an execution site and places associated with Ta Mok, a brutal commander and Anlong Veng's last boss.

"People want to see the last stronghold of the Khmer Rouge and places where they committed atrocities," says Seang Sokheng, who heads the district tourism office and himself an ex-Khmer Rouge soldier.

Anlong Veng, he says, now receives about 2,000 Cambodian and 60 foreign tourists each month — a number that should jump when a casino is built by tycoons from nearby Thailand. A museum is also in the works, spearheaded by Nhem En, the chief photographer of the Khmer Rouge's S-21 torture center in Phnom Penh, a major tourist attraction for years.

"There are museums about World War II in Europe and people are still interested in Hitler. Why not about one of the world's most infamous leaders?" says Nhem En, now the deputy chief of Anlong Veng district. The museum will include his extensive photo collection and even a rice field to show visitors how people slaved under Khmer Rouge guns during their mid-1970s reign of terror.

Like virtually everyone here, he says he took no part in the atrocities but blames the top leaders.

"Pol Pot was cremated here. Please help to preserve this historical site," reads a sign next to a mound demarcated by bottles stuck into the ground and protected by a rusting, corrugated iron roof. A few wilting flowers sprout around the unguarded grave site, which officials complain has been virtually stripped of Pol Pot's cremated remains by foreign tourists.

"People come here, especially on holy days, because they believe Pol Pot's spirit is powerful," says Tith Ponlok, who served as the leader's bodyguard and lives near the burial ground.

Cambodians in the area, he says, have won an unusual number of lotteries, prompting Thais to come across the border and beseech Pol Pot to reveal winning numbers in their dreams. Government officials from Phnom Penh and others also make the pilgrimage, asking his spirit to make assorted wishes come true.

March 27, 2009
Compiled by Kate Stanton for NewsHour Extra
National Public Radio (USA)

The first of five Khmer Rouge leaders will appear before a tribunal next week for committing war crimes and crimes against humanity in Cambodia from 1975 to 1979.


In an attempt to establish an extreme form of communism based on peasant labor, the Khmer Rouge is considered responsible for the deaths of at least 1.7 million people through torture, starvation and execution.

The first trial will begin next week for Kaing Guek Eav, former leader of the Khmer Rouge’s largest torture center Tuol Sleng, where at least 14,000 people were killed. Four other senior Khmer Rouge officials are currently detained and under investigation.

Former United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan said in 2006 that the crimes committed by the Khmer Rouge “were of a character and scale that it was still almost impossible to comprehend."

“The victims of those horrific crimes have waited too long for justice,” he added.

A classless society?

The Cambodian communist party Khmer Rouge rose to power in 1975 by positioning themselves as defenders of the peasant class and in opposition to American involvement in Southeast Asia and Vietnamese occupation of parts of Cambodia.
Under the leadership of Pol Pot, the Khmer Rouge extolled the virtues of the rural farming classes while objecting to any group that they associated with capitalist class ideology – including people from the cities, teachers, and working professionals.

Dreaming of a utopian farming society, the Khmer Rouge moved much of Cambodia’s urban population to the countryside to work in agricultural labor camps where many people died from exhaustion, starvation and sickness.

Although most of the Khmer Rouge leaders were middle-class graduates of foreign universities, they hoped to turn Cambodia into a classless society by eliminating private property and forcing people to work on farming communes.

They made a distinction between “old people,” the preexisting farming class, and “new people,” former city-dwellers. The “new people” were subject to much harsher treatment, living and working in the most laborious, unsanitary and dangerous conditions.

The 'Killing Fields'

The Khmer Rouge leadership tortured and executed many people for sympathizing with suspected “enemy” groups like foreign governments, religious institutions and intellectuals.

After interrogation and torture at a prison like Tuol Sleng, the accused and their families were often brought to so-called “Killing Fields,” sites where mass executions took place.

One of the most infamous sites is Choeung Ek, where thousands of people were executed with pickaxes and buried together in large graves. After the fall of the Khmer Rouge, almost 9,000 bodies were discovered at Choeung Ek and today, around 5,000 skulls of the executed are on display at the site as a memorial to the dead.

Delayed justice

Former Chief of State Khieu Samphan claims that he was not directly responsible for atrocities committed by the Khmer Rouge.

Following an invasion from the Vietnamese in 1979, the Khmer Rouge lost power but remained in tact as a fringe group until 1996, when Pol Pot formally disbanded the group.

Economic troubles and political wrangling delayed the arrangement of a court to try the perpetrators of the Cambodian genocide. The Cambodian government finally approved a mix of local and United Nations judges to oversee the tribunal in 2006, three decades after the Khmer Rouge’s crimes took place.

Called the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia, the court will try the officials under both Cambodian and international criminal law.

Along with Kaing Guek Eav – commonly known as Duch – the court will also try 82 year-old second-in-command Nuon Chea, and former Chief of State, Khieu Samphan, who recently suffered a stroke.

Former Foreign Minister Ieng Sary and his wife former Deputy Prime Minister Ieng Thirith will also appear before the tribunal.

Human rights groups have criticized the length of time it has taken to prosecute the accused, worrying that the Khmer Rouge officials will die before they can be brought to justice. The Khmer Rouge’s most notorious leader, Pol Pot, died in 1998.

March 27, 2009
Compiled by Kate Stanton for NewsHour Extra
National Public Radio (USA)

The first of five Khmer Rouge leaders will appear before a tribunal next week for committing war crimes and crimes against humanity in Cambodia from 1975 to 1979.


In an attempt to establish an extreme form of communism based on peasant labor, the Khmer Rouge is considered responsible for the deaths of at least 1.7 million people through torture, starvation and execution.

The first trial will begin next week for Kaing Guek Eav, former leader of the Khmer Rouge’s largest torture center Tuol Sleng, where at least 14,000 people were killed. Four other senior Khmer Rouge officials are currently detained and under investigation.

Former United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan said in 2006 that the crimes committed by the Khmer Rouge “were of a character and scale that it was still almost impossible to comprehend."

“The victims of those horrific crimes have waited too long for justice,” he added.

A classless society?

The Cambodian communist party Khmer Rouge rose to power in 1975 by positioning themselves as defenders of the peasant class and in opposition to American involvement in Southeast Asia and Vietnamese occupation of parts of Cambodia.
Under the leadership of Pol Pot, the Khmer Rouge extolled the virtues of the rural farming classes while objecting to any group that they associated with capitalist class ideology – including people from the cities, teachers, and working professionals.

Dreaming of a utopian farming society, the Khmer Rouge moved much of Cambodia’s urban population to the countryside to work in agricultural labor camps where many people died from exhaustion, starvation and sickness.

Although most of the Khmer Rouge leaders were middle-class graduates of foreign universities, they hoped to turn Cambodia into a classless society by eliminating private property and forcing people to work on farming communes.

They made a distinction between “old people,” the preexisting farming class, and “new people,” former city-dwellers. The “new people” were subject to much harsher treatment, living and working in the most laborious, unsanitary and dangerous conditions.

The 'Killing Fields'

The Khmer Rouge leadership tortured and executed many people for sympathizing with suspected “enemy” groups like foreign governments, religious institutions and intellectuals.

After interrogation and torture at a prison like Tuol Sleng, the accused and their families were often brought to so-called “Killing Fields,” sites where mass executions took place.

One of the most infamous sites is Choeung Ek, where thousands of people were executed with pickaxes and buried together in large graves. After the fall of the Khmer Rouge, almost 9,000 bodies were discovered at Choeung Ek and today, around 5,000 skulls of the executed are on display at the site as a memorial to the dead.

Delayed justice

Former Chief of State Khieu Samphan claims that he was not directly responsible for atrocities committed by the Khmer Rouge.

Following an invasion from the Vietnamese in 1979, the Khmer Rouge lost power but remained in tact as a fringe group until 1996, when Pol Pot formally disbanded the group.

Economic troubles and political wrangling delayed the arrangement of a court to try the perpetrators of the Cambodian genocide. The Cambodian government finally approved a mix of local and United Nations judges to oversee the tribunal in 2006, three decades after the Khmer Rouge’s crimes took place.

Called the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia, the court will try the officials under both Cambodian and international criminal law.

Along with Kaing Guek Eav – commonly known as Duch – the court will also try 82 year-old second-in-command Nuon Chea, and former Chief of State, Khieu Samphan, who recently suffered a stroke.

Former Foreign Minister Ieng Sary and his wife former Deputy Prime Minister Ieng Thirith will also appear before the tribunal.

Human rights groups have criticized the length of time it has taken to prosecute the accused, worrying that the Khmer Rouge officials will die before they can be brought to justice. The Khmer Rouge’s most notorious leader, Pol Pot, died in 1998.

Once-Feared Rebel Says She Won’t Testify

By Sok Khemara, VOA Khmer
Original report from Cambodia
27 March 2009


A well-known former Khmer Rouge district chief says she’ll take legal action if she’s indicted by a broader list of suspects by tribunal prosecutors and won’t testify in the courts.

Yeay Chaem, known during the revolution as Im Chaem, told VOA Khmer in a rare interview that she had nothing to do with the killings that came to characterize the regime, despite numerous testimonies from the villagers in the area who said they learned to fear her name.

“I can tell you frankly that I did not commit anything linked to [the loss of] human life,” the 65-year-old Yeay Chaem said, speaking from her home in the former Khmer Rouge sanctuary of Anlong Veng, located in a remote part of northwestern Cambodia. “I will not answer, and I will not accept, if my name is brought for indictment. I will protest, because [the tribunal] should find truth and solutions according to just means.”

Her words echo the sentiments of many former regime members, as the Khmer Rouge tribunal prepares to try five of its former leaders, including prison chief Duch, whose trial begins Monday. Prosecutors at the special court are at odds over whether to indict more regime cadre and are awaiting a decision by pre-trial judges.

Some observers, like Youk Chhang, director of the Documentation Center of Cambodia, say an increase in indictments will not cause instability, one of the reasons given for limiting the number of leaders arrested. Those who could be brought to trial are many, he said. After all, there were 198 prison chiefs like Duch, who is facing atrocity crimes charges for his role in the alleged torture and execution of more than 12,000 Cambodians.

Like many former leaders of the regime, Yeay Chaem does not see herself among those who should be indicted. Now a deputy commune chief in Anglong Veng, she speaks with authority, and in a recent interview she was confident and smiling.

She said as a Khmer Rouge district chief, her role was to help people cultivate rice, and her position as a female leader in the government of Democratic Kampuchea was highlighted in a film that was shown nationwide. People have sometimes apologized to her for wrongly accusing her of killings, she said.

Villagers in the district of Preah Net Preah, Banteay Meanchey province, where Yeay Chaem was once in charge, tell a different story. Many said they were much afraid of her in the 1970s, when farmers in her area went missing for infractions against the revolution.

“Even though she’s a woman, she ordered killings, that’s why there was death,” said one man in Phnom Leap village. (No villager was willing to be named, fearing reprisal.)

The man described being nearly killed himself by Yeay Chaem’s bodyguards, after he suggested farmers in the area be given more food. He was able to untie his bonds before he was killed, he said, and fled to Thailand.

Another villager said he was nearly killed too, for farming rice improperly.

“The one who supervised me to pull rice [seedlings] was killed with his family members in a nearby area, as she was angered at him pulling in an improper way,” the man said, referring to Yeay Chaem. “Whether they were killed or not, I didn’t see with my own eyes, but that family went missing forever.”

Villagers say they learned to fear the name of Im Chaem, but the former cadre now says that’s only because she was rumored to have magic that could stop bullets. That wasn’t true, she said.

People did die, she said, but not by her orders. “Some died on the battlefield, some died because there was no food, as we were a country at war.” She regretted there had not been enough food or shelter for people. “I’m not afraid, because I did nothing wrong.”

Even though she could be a suspect, Yeay Chaem said she supports the current tribunal efforts to try leaders of the regime.

“I’m very grateful for the discovery of justice for our brothers and sisters of that era,” she said. “But if they indict me, I don’t agree, and for myself, if they bring me to testify, they must contact me with clear proof. If not, it’s not my business; I will not go.”

Some villagers think Yeay Chaem should be prosecuted, even if they never directly saw her do any killing. Many people went missing in the area she controlled, they said.

“In Phnom Leap, here, there were a lot of graves,” said one. “One grave had 200 people; 50, 60, also have.”

Pointing to a mountain named Phnom Trayong, a monk said many killings had taken place there.

“To find this lady with your own eye, whether she herself did the killing, was impossible,” one villager said. “If we went near [an execution] they would kill us too.”

Once-Feared Rebel Says She Won’t Testify

By Sok Khemara, VOA Khmer
Original report from Cambodia
27 March 2009


A well-known former Khmer Rouge district chief says she’ll take legal action if she’s indicted by a broader list of suspects by tribunal prosecutors and won’t testify in the courts.

Yeay Chaem, known during the revolution as Im Chaem, told VOA Khmer in a rare interview that she had nothing to do with the killings that came to characterize the regime, despite numerous testimonies from the villagers in the area who said they learned to fear her name.

“I can tell you frankly that I did not commit anything linked to [the loss of] human life,” the 65-year-old Yeay Chaem said, speaking from her home in the former Khmer Rouge sanctuary of Anlong Veng, located in a remote part of northwestern Cambodia. “I will not answer, and I will not accept, if my name is brought for indictment. I will protest, because [the tribunal] should find truth and solutions according to just means.”

Her words echo the sentiments of many former regime members, as the Khmer Rouge tribunal prepares to try five of its former leaders, including prison chief Duch, whose trial begins Monday. Prosecutors at the special court are at odds over whether to indict more regime cadre and are awaiting a decision by pre-trial judges.

Some observers, like Youk Chhang, director of the Documentation Center of Cambodia, say an increase in indictments will not cause instability, one of the reasons given for limiting the number of leaders arrested. Those who could be brought to trial are many, he said. After all, there were 198 prison chiefs like Duch, who is facing atrocity crimes charges for his role in the alleged torture and execution of more than 12,000 Cambodians.

Like many former leaders of the regime, Yeay Chaem does not see herself among those who should be indicted. Now a deputy commune chief in Anglong Veng, she speaks with authority, and in a recent interview she was confident and smiling.

She said as a Khmer Rouge district chief, her role was to help people cultivate rice, and her position as a female leader in the government of Democratic Kampuchea was highlighted in a film that was shown nationwide. People have sometimes apologized to her for wrongly accusing her of killings, she said.

Villagers in the district of Preah Net Preah, Banteay Meanchey province, where Yeay Chaem was once in charge, tell a different story. Many said they were much afraid of her in the 1970s, when farmers in her area went missing for infractions against the revolution.

“Even though she’s a woman, she ordered killings, that’s why there was death,” said one man in Phnom Leap village. (No villager was willing to be named, fearing reprisal.)

The man described being nearly killed himself by Yeay Chaem’s bodyguards, after he suggested farmers in the area be given more food. He was able to untie his bonds before he was killed, he said, and fled to Thailand.

Another villager said he was nearly killed too, for farming rice improperly.

“The one who supervised me to pull rice [seedlings] was killed with his family members in a nearby area, as she was angered at him pulling in an improper way,” the man said, referring to Yeay Chaem. “Whether they were killed or not, I didn’t see with my own eyes, but that family went missing forever.”

Villagers say they learned to fear the name of Im Chaem, but the former cadre now says that’s only because she was rumored to have magic that could stop bullets. That wasn’t true, she said.

People did die, she said, but not by her orders. “Some died on the battlefield, some died because there was no food, as we were a country at war.” She regretted there had not been enough food or shelter for people. “I’m not afraid, because I did nothing wrong.”

Even though she could be a suspect, Yeay Chaem said she supports the current tribunal efforts to try leaders of the regime.

“I’m very grateful for the discovery of justice for our brothers and sisters of that era,” she said. “But if they indict me, I don’t agree, and for myself, if they bring me to testify, they must contact me with clear proof. If not, it’s not my business; I will not go.”

Some villagers think Yeay Chaem should be prosecuted, even if they never directly saw her do any killing. Many people went missing in the area she controlled, they said.

“In Phnom Leap, here, there were a lot of graves,” said one. “One grave had 200 people; 50, 60, also have.”

Pointing to a mountain named Phnom Trayong, a monk said many killings had taken place there.

“To find this lady with your own eye, whether she herself did the killing, was impossible,” one villager said. “If we went near [an execution] they would kill us too.”

Ethnic Composition
The population of Cambodia today is about 10 million. About 90-95 percent of the people are Khmer ethnic. The remaining 5-10 percent include Chinese-Khmers, Khmer Islam or Chams, ethnic hill-tribe people, known as the Khmer Loeu, and Vietnamese. About 10 percent of the population lives in Phnom Penh, the capital, making Cambodia largely a country of rural dwellers, farmers and artisans.The ethnic groups that constitute Cambodian society possess a number of economic and demographic commonalties- for example. Chinese merchants lived mainly in urban centers and play middlemen in many economic cycles, but they also preserve differences in their social and cultural institutions. They were concentrated mostly in central and in southeastern Cambodia, the major differences among these groups lie in social organization, language, and religion. The majority of the inhabitants of Cambodia are settled in fairly permanent villages near the major bodies of water in the Tonle Sap Basin-Mekong Lowlands region. The Khmer Loeu live in widely scattered villages that are abandoned when the cultivated land in the vicinity is exhausted. The permanently settled Khmer and Cham villages usually located on or near the banks of a river or other bodies of water. Cham villages usually are made up almost entirely of Cham, but Khmer villages, especially in central and in southeastern of Cambodia, typically include sizable Chinese communities.

The Khmer Loeu
The Khmer Loeu are the non-Khmer highland tribes in Cambodia. The Khmer Loeu are found namely in the northeastern provinces of Rattanakiri, Stung Treng, Mondulkiri and Crate. Most Khmer Loeu live in scattered temporary villages that have only a few hundred inhabitants. These villages usually are governed by a council of local elders or by a village headman. The Khmer Loeu cultivate a wide variety of plants, but the man crop is dry or upland rice growth by the slash-and-burn method. Hunting, fishing, and gathering supplement the cultivated vegetable foods in the Khmer Loeu diet. Houses vary from huge multi-family long houses to small single family structures. They may be built close to the ground or on stilts. The major Khmer Loeu groups in Cambodia are the Kuy, Phnong, Brao, Jarai, and Rade. All but about 160,000 Kuy lived in the northern Cambodia provinces of Kampong Thom, Preah Vihear, and Stoeng as well as in adjacent Thailand.

The Cham
The Cham people in Cambodia descend from refugees of the Kingdom of Champa, which one ruled much of Vietnam between Gao Ha in the north and Bien Hao in the south. The Cambodian Chams are divided into two groups, the orthodox and the traditional- base on their religious practices. The orthodox group, which make up about one-third of the total number of Chams in the country, were located mainly in Phnom Penh - Oudong area and in the provinces of Takeo and Kapot. The traditional Chams were scattered throughout the midsection of the country in the provinces of Battambang, Kompong Thom, Kompong Cham, and Pursat. The Chams of both groups typically live in villages inhabited only by other Chams; the villages may be along the shores of watercourses, or they may be inland. The inhabitants of the river villages engage in fishing and growing vegetables. They trade fish to local Khmer for rice. The women in these villages earn money by weaving. The Chams who live inland support themselves by various means, depending on the villages. Some villages specialize in metalworking; others raise fruit trees or vegetables. The Chams also often serve as butchers of cattle for their Khmer Buddhist neighbors and are, in some areas, regarded as skillful water buffalo and ram breeders.

The Chinese
The Chinese in Cambodia formed the country �es largest ethnic minority. Sixty percent of the Chinese were urban dwellers engaged mainly in commerce; the other 40 percent were rural residents working as shopkeepers, as buyers and processors of rice, palm sugar, fruit, and fish, and as money lenders. It is estimated that 90 percent of the Chinese in Cambodia were in commerce and that 92 percent of those involved in commerce in Cambodia were Chinese. In rural Cambodia, the Chinese were moneylenders, and they wielded considerable economic power over the ethnic Khmer peasants through usury. The Chinese in Cambodia represented five major linguistic groups, the largest of which was the Teochiu (accounting about 60 percent), followed by the Cantonese (accounting about 20 percent), the Hokkien (accounting about 7 percent), and the Hakka and the Hainanese (each accounting for 4 percent). Those belonging to the certain Chinese linguistic groups in Cambodia tended to gravitate to certain occupations. The Teochiu, who make up about 90 percent of the rural Chinese population, ran village stores, control rural credit and rice marketing facilities, and grew vegetables. In urban areas they were often engaged in such enterprises as the import-export business, the sale of pharmaceuticals, and street peddling. The Cantonese, who were the majority of Chinese groups before Teochiu migrations began in the late 1930s, live mainly in the city. Typically, the Cantonese engages in transportation and in constriction, for the most part as mechanics or carpenters. The Hokkien community was involved import-export and in banking, and it included some of the country�fs richest Chinese. The Hainanese started out as pepper growers in Kompot Province, where they continued to dominate that business. Many moved to Phnom Penh , where, in the late 1960s, they reportedly had virtual monopoly on the hotel and restaurant business. They also often operated tailor shops. In Phnom Penh, the newly arrived Hakka were typically folk dentists, sellers of traditional Chinese medicines, and shoemakers.

The Vietnamese
The Vietnamese community is scattered throughout southeastern and central Cambodia. They were concentrated in Phnom Penh, and in Kandal, Prey Veng, and Kampong Cham provinces. No close cultural or religious ties exist between Cambodia and Vietnam. The Vietnamese fall within the Chinese culture sphere, rather within the Indian, where the Thai and Khmer belong. The Vietnamese differ from the Khmer in mode of dress, in kinship organization, and in many other ways- for example the Vietnamese are Mahayama Buddhists while most of the Cambodians are Theravada Buddhists. Although Vietnamese lived in urban centers such as Phnom Penh, a substantial number lived along the lower Mekong and Bassac rivers as well as on the shores of the Tonle Sap, where they engaged in fishing.