[The following is in regards to the trial of Kaing Guek Eav, commonly known as Comrade Duch, who was the head of the Khmer Rouge’s internal security branch, in which he oversaw the Tuol Sleng (S-21) prison camp where thousands were held for interrogation and torture. While the trial itself takes place in the early 2000s, I still felt it appropriate, as the trial only covered events taking place between the years 1975-1979. Every testimony is from that time period, and everything depicted by the author, who was present at the trial, are essentially reactions to this gruesome period of history by contemporaries who were present or had participated. In that sense, I feel this fits well for our purposes, and I do not believe it breaks the 20 Year Rule.]
[For context: Ouk Ket was a student from Cambodia who studied in Paris. He later met a Frenchwoman and they were married in October of 1971. They had two children together. When the Khmer Rouge first took over his home country, he decided to return home and spend some time participating in what he believed, optimistically, would be a new golden era for Cambodia. He didn’t realized he would be detained on arrival and executed.]
One rainy October day, I went to a provincial forum organized by the tribunal’s office for the civil parties in its second case, in which the regime’s four highest-ranking, still-living leaders were to be tried. The regional governor was to open the forum. She had hardly begun her speech when she burst into tears. Her father, husband, and son had all disappeared in Khmer Rouge “cooperatives.” Her emotion was undiminished thirty years on.
Then a Cambodian lawyer, only recently recruited to represent victims, declared that she, too, had been persecuted. She sobbed uncontrollably. Someone else admitted to having suffered psychological trouble and having had to consult specialists. An old Muslim man at the back of the hall got to his feet: “I am a victim of the Khmer Rouge. Is there a medicine to treat my mental problems?” Then, referring to the cases before the tribunal, he said: “We are dealing with only one germ. We have all the other germs in our bodies.”
Time doesn’t resolve anything for Ouk Ket’s widow, either. “For the past thirty-two years, Ket’s face has been unbearable. I miss him always,” she says, looking up to try to stop her tears. “The pain hasn’t faded; it has only gotten stronger. It’s like an ocean in front of you. The result, for me, has been a complete breakdown.”
Ouk Ket’s daughter is older today than her father was when he died. She says that the day she put her finger on the S-21 register, a drop of poison entered her. Shortly after, she abandoned her studies. Like Kerry Hamill’s younger brother, she ended up haunted by wild and uncontrollable thoughts.
”It was necessary for me to imagine it. Unfortunately, I imagined the worst.”
Source:
Cruvellier, T., and Alex Gilly. “Chapter 32.” The Master of Confessions: The Making of a Khmer Rouge Torturer. Ecco, 2014. 252-53. Print.
Further Reading:
សារមន្ទីរឧក្រិដ្ឋកម្មប្រល័យពូជសាសន៍ទួលស្លែង (Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum) / Security Prison 21 (S-21)
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