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An estimated
1.5 - 3 million worked or starved to death, died of disease or exposure, or were
executed for committing crimes. Crimes punishable by death include not working
hard enough, complaining about living conditions, collecting or stealing food
for personal consumption, wearing jewelry, engaging in sexual relations,
grieving over the loss of relatives or friends and expressing religious
sentiments.
The Killing Fields were a number of sites in
Cambodia where
large numbers of people were killed and buried by the
Khmer Rouge
communist
regime which ruled the country, as
Democratic Kampuchea,
from 1975 to 1979 . Estimates of the number of dead range from 1.7 to 2.3
million out of a population of around 7 million. The Khmer Rouge judicial
process, for minor or political crimes, began with a warning from the
Angkar, the
government of Cambodia under the regime. People receiving more than two warnings
were sent for "re-education," which meant near-certain death. People were often
encouraged to confess to Angkar their "pre-revolutionary lifestyles and crimes"
(which usually included some kind of free-market activity, or having had contact
with a foreign source, such as a US missionary, or international relief or
government agency, or contact with any foreigner or with the outside world at
all), being told that Angkar would forgive them and "wipe the slate clean." This
meant being taken away to a place such as
Tuol Sleng
(S-21 prison) or
Choeung Ek for
torture and/or
execution.
Toul Sleng Prison (S-21
Prison)
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the cell |
the cell |
S-21 was a high school when Pol Pot turned it
into an important secret prison operated in Phnom Penh from mid-1975 through the
end of 1978. Kaing Khek Iev (also known as Duch) was the governor of the Tuol
Sleng detention center. Those that were brought to S-21 were those inside the
Khmer Rouge, and thought to have betrayed the movement.
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