The Cambodian Genocide

Cambodia’s leader Prince Sihanouk and his monarchy were overthrown in a military coup.
  * Lieutenant Lon Nol took over and formed a new right-wing government.
  * In response, Prince Sihanouk and his supporters joined a communist guerrilla organization called the Khmer Rouge.
  * In 1970, the Khmer Rouge attacked Lon Nol’s army, starting a civil war. In 1975, the Khmer Rouge overthrew Lon Nol’s government and took power.
Immediately after taking power, he led a campaign to rid the country (renamed “Democratic Kampuchea”) of all class distinctions that existed between rural and urban populations. The Khmer Rouge envisioned a Cambodia without cities, private property, or money, where all goods would have to be exchanged and bartered. They forced all urban Cambodians out of the cities and made them adopt a new lifestyle as farmers in the countryside.
The Khmer Rouge sought to control every aspect of Cambodians’ lives. As part of the “transition,” the Khmer Rouge destroyed all banks and currency, abolished telephone and postal services, forbade religion, and censored the media. They collected and destroyed clothing, forcing everyone to wear the same government-issued black pants and shirts. The Khmer Rouge also closed all hospitals and banned medications. In addition, they dismantled the educational system and confiscated and burned all books.

The new leadership killed any perceived resistors or “non-valuable” members of society. In its transition to communism, the regime hunted down former Lon Nol government soldiers, civil servants, Buddhist monks, ethnic and religious minorities, elderly citizens, intellectuals, and groups of people thought to have contact with Vietnamese (such as Eastern Khmers). They often executed people simply for wearing glasses—thought to be a symbol of intelligence and literacy.

As military activity increased in Cambodia, President Nixon had authorized bombings in Cambodia. There were more than 36,000 bombing missions against Cambodia, and Nixon had also ordered U.S. invasion of Cambodia. This worsened the condition in Cambodia significantly.
As usual, the U.S. did not do much to prevent the human rights abuse that was happening in Cambodia, and only acted in national interests.
When Jimmy Carter came into office, he tried harder to prioritize human rights issues in Cambodia. Although he had tried to make emphasis on those issues, most of his effort was taken away by the Cold War initiatives and domestic priorities.

The genocide ended when Vietnam invaded Cambodia in response to the Khmer Rouge of persecution of Vietnamese living in Cambodia and attacks against Vietnamese along border areas. The Vietnamese overthrew the Khmer government and forced the Khmer Rouge into exile in the countryside, which stopped the genocide.

The UN and Cambodia reached an agreement to establish an international genocide court (the ECCC) in March 2003. The court sentenced former prison direction Kaing Guek Eav, to nineteen years in prison for mass murder and torture. The ECCC were basically trials that decided what to do with those who participated in the genocide and the perpetuators.

There are thirteen reparation programs that seek to compensate victims and their families in some way for their losses. These programs do not offer money, since Cambodia itself has scarce resources and economy. These programs promoted healing through: memorials, free pyschological services, and an app for the young people to learn about the history of the Khmer Rouge period. There is also a nonprofit group, one of the many, that provides training and networking for artists, including leadership.