When most people think of genocide, they envision an attempt by one race or ethnic group to exterminate another – think Holocaust and Darfur. The Khmer Rouge in Cambodia demonstrates that a government can be guilty of genocide against its own people.

The radical Communist Khmer Rouge led by Pol Pot ruled Cambodia from 1975 to 1979, during which time nearly two million people were killed outright or died as a result of torture, disease overwork and starvation.

Pol Pot was born as Saloth Sar and was educated in Paris.  He became the leader of the Cambodian Communist Party by 1962 and earned the name Pol Pot based on a shortened version of a French phrase that means “political potential.” He visited China during the Communist Revolution and was inspired by Chinese program that “purified” China and purged “class enemies.”

After Pol Pot and his black-clad followers captured the capital, they immediately began a campaign of “purification” which cleansed the country of:

• Urban and Western life: The cities were evacuated and millions were marched into the countryside in a fanatical attempt to create a pure peasant society.
• Capitalism: To make the country self-sufficient, it was turned into a giant labor camp – radical form of agrarian communism.
• Religion: Buddhism, the dominant religion, was attacked in the form of suppression and killing of monks. Of 60,000 Buddhist monks only 3,000 were found alive after the Khmer Rouge reign.
• Educated Elite: Doctors, teachers, engineers, and any person of a professional occupation were killed along with the extended family.
• Foreigners, especially Chinese, Vietnamese, Muslims: Only half of the Chinese population survived. Thousands of Vietnamese were expelled and killed, and of the 250,000 Muslims in the country, 90,000 were massacred.

The Khmer Rouge actively sealed off the country so the world could not look in. The killing could begin.

One of Pol Pot’s goals was to institute a new calendar starting at Year Zero, thus making Cambodian history before Year Zero irrelevant. The idea was that all cultural and traditional parts of society would have to be destroyed in order for the culture of the revolution to replace it and the society could start from scratch. This is one of the reasons the Khmer Rouge murdered Cambodia’s educated elite and their families; it would easier to eradicate a society that did not have educators and cultural intellectuals.

Tuol Sleng Prison

Formerly the Tuol Svay Prey High School, the building of the complex were converted into a prison and interrogation center and renamed “Security Prison 21” (S-21). From 1975 to 1979, 17,000 peopole were registered and photographed, then imprisoned and tortured, before they were killed.

The torture system at Tuol Sleng was designed to make prisoners confess to whatever crimes they were charged with by their captors. Prisoners were routinely beaten and tortured in various ways including electric shock, searing hot metal instruments, and hanging. Other methods for generating confessions included pulling out fingernails while pouring alcohol on their wounds or holding prisoners’ heads under water.

When the Vietnamese Army invaded in 1979, the S-21 staff fled, leaving thousands of written and photographic records. Former prison staff say as many as 30,000 prisoners were held at the S-21 before the Khmer Rouge leadership was forced to flee. Out of all those imprisoned, there were only twelve known survivors.

After three years of terror, Pol Pot was driven from power in 1979 by an invasion from neighboring Vietnam. He fled to Thailand where he remained for six years. When Vietname withdrew from Cambodia, Pol Pot returned and the Khmer Rouge gained power. By 1996, the power of Khmer Rouge was again waning and some Khmer Rouge officials defected. Pol Pot attempted to flee but was captured and subjected to what many called a “show trial.” Pol Pot died on the very night that word got out that he would be handed over to an international tribunal to face charges on crimes against humanity.

Modern Cambodia

The Khmer Rouge left behind a traumatized society that continues to suffer the repercussions of the Khmer Rouge genocide. Almost everyone over 40 in Cambodia has stories to tell of terror, abuse, hunger and the loss of family members. But those stories often fall on the deaf ears of a new generation that either cannot conceive of such brutality or seems unwilling to learn about it.

As much as 70% of the country’s population is under the age of 30 – just another result of the massacre of millions by Khmer Rouge – and four out of five members of this young generation know little or nothing about the Khmer Rouge years, according to a survey last fall by the Human Rights Center at UC Berkeley.

Beyond the question of age, misinformation about the past appears to be a combination of culture and policy. The Khmer Rouge period has not been taught in school. A new high school textbook that discusses the Khmer Rouge years has been prepared, but it will reach only a portion of the country’s students.

That ignorance – among both young and older – seems also to extend to the trials of major Khmer Rouge figures that began earlier this year, a process that is meant, in part, to begin a process of healing and closure.

In 2006, more than 27 years after the mass killings, formal proceedings began against surviving leaders of the brutal regime. Pol Pot and his military chief, Ta Mok, died before either could be punished for their atrocities.

The trials of the five senior Khmer Rouge figures began in February and are raising questions about the guilt – or victimhood – of lower-ranking cadres, the people who carried out the arrests, killing and torture, and who are likely to be untried. Many say that they took part in the executions because they were threatened with death themselves.

Cambodia Genocide remembered

April 17 is recognized as Cambodian Genocide Commemoration Day. On the same day 34 years ago, Khmer Rouge forces entered Phnom Penh, defeated the ruling army, and began their reign of fear.

Interested in joining this commemoration?

• Host a movie screening of The Killing Fields based on the story of a NY Times Reporter and his Cambodian assistant who was trapped in Cambodia during the 1975 Khmer Rouge revolution and ensuing genocide.
• Read, "First They Killed My Father: A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers" by Loung Ung: The story touches on the deaths and forced separation of family members and reflects the brutality of the Khmer Rouge regime.

Want to do something about genocides going on now? See what you can do about Darfur.