Mass graves at the Killing Field of Cheoung Ek. An estimated 17,000 victims were executed on this field and buried here in mass graves.
This post contains graphic images and information about the Cambodian Genocide carried out by the Khmer Rouge in the 1970’s. As hard as it was to experience, write about, or read, we felt it was an important journey for us to make during our time in Cambodia. We feel it is a worthwhile one to share with our readers as well.
“To keep you is no benefit. To destroy you is no loss.” ~ one of the mottos of the Khmer Rouge
After seizing power of Cambodia in April 1975, Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge sought to create a purely agrarian-based Communist Society. It forced over 2 millions citizens from the cities onto collective farms to take up work farming in order to produce enough food to become a self-sustaining country. Possessions and money were banned, books were burned, hospitals and schools were destroyed. Families were broken up. Children and parents were separated. And the government controlled every aspect of their lives: where you lived, who you spoke to, what you worked on.
They were given unrealistic demands to triple the amount of rice produced on these farms. And, being inexperienced in agriculture as many of these people were, it couldn’t happen. More than a million people died, either from starvation or from lack of medical treatment.
Pol Pot and his Khmer Rouge regime then set out to eliminate anyone suspected of capitalistic behavior, intellectuals, city dwellers, those with foreign ties, and just about anyone with an education.
In 1976, the Khmer Rouge founded a secret torture prison in an old high school on the outskirts of Phnom Penh. They named it S-21 and over the next three years they would torture and interrogate over 17,000 people here. Then they would load these people onto trucks under the cover of night and drive them to a secret compound at Cheoung Ek, about 15 km out of town. They would tell them they were being relocated to a new house so that any attempts at escape or scenes of screaming along the road could be avoided. But, once they arrived, they were carefully checked off the list (many even had to sign their own names – not realizing they were signing their own death warrant), and then systematically murdered and dumped into mass graves. At the height of this genocide, more than 300 people a day were brought to Choeung Ek and executed. Choeung Ek was only one of countless killing fields throughout Cambodia. It is estimated that there are over 20,000 mass graves throughout the country.
Bullets were too costly, so the executioners used whatever creative means they could find, often using farming tools or the serrated edges of sugar palm fronds. Most were killed by a blow to the neck or head before being dumped into mass graves. But, in order to insure that all were dead, as well as to disguise the smell so that the neighbors wouldn’t suspect what was going on here, they then poured DDT over the bodies.
By 1979, when the Vietnamese army liberated Cambodia from the Khmer Rouge, over 17,000 people had been tortured at S-21 and then executed and buried at the Killing Field at Choeung Ek. Nationwide, almost 2 million people were murdered and buried in similar mass graves. Men & women, old & young, nobody was safe from the Khmer Rouge.
We started off our journey as so many of these victims did; with a visit to S-21. Formerly a high school on the edge of Phnom Penh, from the outside it still looks like one, with large classroom buildings around a central courtyard. But inside are dark secrets and to walk the hallways and enter the classrooms is to take a journey through horror.
The Khmer Rouge kept detailed records and photographed everything they did, in order to prove to their party leaders that orders were carried out. From photos of the victims, both before, during, and after interrogations, to the interrogation rooms and prison cells, much is left just as it was found by the Vietnamese in 1979.
We traveled the same hallways and staircases as these victims, as we explored the classrooms turned into torturous interrogation rooms, the cells built out of brick or wood, where these people were chained together as they awaited death, and the rooms where the Khmer Rouge meticulously recorded and stored records of everything that happened here, and everyone who passed this way.
We read stories of families who were split up and stories of children and teenagers who were forced to serve in the Khmer Rouge and perpetrate so many of the horrors that the party leaders cooked up. And we read the stories of the party leaders who are currently on trial for their crimes against humanity.
As we traveled from room to room, viewing hundreds and thousands of photographs, we grew emotionally weary, but we couldn’t stop looking. Who are we to deny these people their right to be remembered and acknowledged for the horrors they witnessed and the inhumanities they suffered? And so we continued to look into the faces, so many with pain, but so many others with a calmness & humanity about them.
I think we will be forever haunted by those photographs. Here is a very small sampling of the ones we saw today. Click on any image to view it larger.
From S-21, we headed out of town to the Killing Field at Choeung Ek.
The first thing you notice when you arrive is how peaceful it is here, a former orchard in a rural area 15 km outside Phnom Penh. As you enter the grounds, the beautiful Memorial Stupa catches your eye, soaring high over the lawns. But as you step closer, you realize that the sides of the stupa are made up of windows, and that it is full of skulls. A sign next to the door says, “Would you please kindly show your respect to many million people who were killed under the genocidal Pol Pot regime.” This is when it fully hits you where you are and what actually happened here.
As a visitor to this place, you are invited to travel the same path as the victims, starting off with the spot where the truck would pull up, and where the prisoners would be checked off a list before being led to their death. Commentary from former Khmer Rouge soldiers and biographers make the story of this place come to life.
From the drop off point and the site of the detention center, you are led further into the compound. We got our first glimpse of the killing fields. Many of the graves here have been excavated, and those graves are surrounded by low bamboo fences and covered with roofs. But many graves have been left untouched, and the fields are dotted with them. Deep impressions in the ground surrounded by higher bits of land. As the bodies decomposed within these graves, the earth sank. We spotted several bones and a set of teeth in one of the graves. The graves are so shallow that remains often are exposed after heavy rains. Several times a year, caretakers collect these remains, along with the remains of clothing, and carefully store them, allowing these victims to rest in peace. The first excavated grave we came across contained 160 bodies. But as we moved further back into the fields, the graves got larger. One contained the remains of 450 people. Another contained over 100 headless bodies…the remains of former Khmer Rouge soldiers who were executed by the Khmer Rouge for treason (which was usually unfounded).
But the most horrific grave was one that contained the remains of only women and children. Mothers and babies executed together. The mothers executed by blows to the head. But the babies and children executed by being beaten against a tree next to the grave, The Chankiri (or Killing) tree. It was the policy of the Khmer Rouge to execute all members of a family, including children, so nobody was left to return and seek revenge. The tree was covered in colorful bracelets ~ tributes from the many visitors to this place.
As we were leaving this grave, it began to rain. Mother Nature matching our mood. Our time here at the Killing Fields was done.
Here are photos from our time at Tuol Sleng Prison in Phnom Penh and at the Killing Field at Choeung Ek.
Hallway at Tuol Sleng Prison. The Khmer Rouge used barbed wire and turned classrooms into mass cells to turn this former high school into a horrific secret prison.
The Prisoner’s Rules of Interrogation at S-21. During the Khmer Rouge regime, more than 17,000 people were imprisoned, interrogated, and tortured here, before being sent to the Killing Fields to be executed.
The Khmer Rouge kept detailed records and photographs. Hanging on the wall of this old classroom is a graphic photograph of a prisoner who was tortured in this very room on this very bed, most likely until he either confessed or died.
One of the interrogation rooms at Tuol Sleng (S-21) prison. In these rooms, victims were brutally tortured until they confessed to whatever their interrogators wanted them to confess to. The man sitting at the desk asked all the questions and kept a detailed account of what was done and said during an interrogation, complete with photos. Reading those accounts today is truly disturbing.
Entrance to the prison cell building, a former classroom building wrapped in barbed wire. Here, prisoners were housed in small brick or wooden cells while waiting for their interrogations or execution. Barbed wire was used to prevent escape and also to prevent any prisoners from committing suicide by jumping off the higher floors.
Prison Cells at Tuol Sleng (S-21) Prison in Phnom Penh. Prisoners were kept in these tiny cells, chained together by their ankles, while they awaited interrogation or execution.
Looking down the row of classrooms turned into mass cells. The Khmer Rouge cut out doorways in the walls separating the rooms to make it easier to patrol them. At the far end you can see a bit of green on the wall ~ a chalkboard, left over from the days when this was still a school.
View of one of the memorials at Tuol Sleng Prison, viewed through the barbed wire of the prison cell building.
Shrine to victims of Tuol Sleng prison in one of the former classrooms. This room contains the remains of many victims who were executed by the Khmer Rouge after being imprisoned and interrogated here. People still visit this altar to pray for those who lost their lives and to make offerings to the dead.
In 1979, as Vietnamese troops were on their way to liberate Tuol Sleng Prison from the Khmer Rouge, there were 21 prisoners at the prison. To cover their horrific secrets of torture, the Khmer Rouge executed 14 of them on the spot. Their remains are buried here in remembrance of what happened. It is a hauntingly beautiful spot, very quiet and serene. We sat here for a while and watched many others stop to make an offering or say a prayer.
Memorial Stupa at Choeung Ek, containing the skulls of victims displayed on 17 different levels. Combining both Buddhist and Hindu imagery, it is a sacred memorial to the more than 17,000 people who were executed here.
View of remains in the memorial Stupa at Choeung Ek.
Remains and a tribute in the Memorial Stupa at Choeung Ek.
The memorial Stupa at Choeung Ek contains remains of many of the victims, sorted by gender & age, and displayed in 17 different levels of a glass tower. To walk in here is haunting.
Skulls of some of the victims of the Killing Field at Choeung Ek. In order to save bullets, most victims were executed with a blow to the head or neck before being dumped into mass graves. Many of the skulls still show the signs of this fatal blow.
The razor sharp edges of a sugar palm frond were often used to slit the throats of victims at Choeung Ek. This was a cheap and quick way to keep them from screaming and to murder them before dumping their bodies into mass graves.
Skeletal remains in one of the mass graves at Choeung Ek. Many of the mass graves here have been left undisturbed, but bones & clothing often are uncovered after heavy rains. These remains are collected and lovingly stored here, at the final resting place of so many.
Bracelets on one of the walls surrounding an excavated grave. Visitors leave these bracelets as tribute and remembrance for the people who lost their lives here. Over 450 people were discovered in this grave alone.
A Chankiri (or Killing) Tree at Cheoung Ek. Executioners beat small children and babies against this tree before tossing them into the mass graves with their mothers. This tree at Choeung Ek is covered with brightly colored bracelet tributes in remembrance of all the children who lost their lives here.
An unexcavated mass grave covered in brightly colored ribbons as tribute to the dead.
A Spirit House at Choeung Ek provides a shelter for the spirits of those who lost their lives here.
Hi Kat,
Devastating article. I am old enough to remember the Khmer Rouge and the Killing Fields. I don’t think Pol Pot was a singular monster–like most torturers, it seems he thought he’d run out of ways to terrify people so he kept trying to top himself. Once the ability to feel sympathy is gone, there’s no limit to what the human mind can conjure up.
Thanks for an essential and sobering journey into the Heart of Darkness. I look forward to many more reports from yonder.
Sincerely,
A. G. Moore