The Killing Fields and S1

NB The photos in the album speak for themselves probably but I have labelled a few. It's the memorial site, the Killing Fields, first then the Prison or S1.

Visiting either of these sites is exceptionally difficult, a challenge to ones sensibilities and emotions. It is not just the things you see but it is what you can hear inside your head that makes it hard. It is the imagination of a hell that should not be there, it is the questioning of what on earth leads some men (women do not appear to be involved here in Cambodia) to behave in such barbaric ways towards other people.

Cheoung Ek or the Killing Fields lie outside Phnom Penh. The drive on a TukTuk was educative in itself. We passed from the wealth of waterfront Phonm Penh into the poor areas, and poor barely does them justice. Nevertheless, there was a lot of activity to b e seen in small workshops ranging from wood to basket making to the mending of bikes. Much evidence of police stopping moto owners and in one case seizing the vehicle but cannot tell why.

Cheoung Ek is not a large place but it has a memorial tower. Here some remains have been placed 'on display' carefully identified as to age and sex. It is hard to stare at the ransk of skulls form the 17 layers in front of you. What is harder is to witness the behaviour of some people. One descended form the steps and spat into a bush. Others chatted. Still others stood in front of it smiling and adopting some alluring pose as their friends took photographs. And the guards did nothing. Why can some people be apparently oblivious to the meaning of the place?

S1 or Tuol Sieng was far grimmer and far tougher to take. As with so many places in Cambodia, outside the gates are people who show their wounds and hold a cap. One cannot give to all but walking past is hard to do. Inside the complex the evidence is brutal and unpleasant. Once a school, it reveals the appalling conditions under which thousands of people were imprisoned and killed. Dingy cells to be held in, torture equipment to extract confessions. Rooms full of photographs along similar lines to those I have seen at Auschwitz and Dachau are horrifying in their silent passport style manner.

It is perhaps a matter of luck that very recently the first judgement in the trials of the remaining Khmer Rouge leadership has been announced and Duch the commander of S1 has been found guilty. What is probably important is that his defence is shown to be calculated and without foundation. His defence was that he was but a link in a chain of terror that everyone struggled to survive. He wasn't my fault, in other words but of course he was responsible for his actions.

Today I bought a memoir of one of the few people to have survived the hell of S1 and that will provide a hard read at some point. First, I must finish my History of Pol Pot.

Whilst making these visits I came across some newspaper articles in the Phnom Penh English dailies and weeklies both of which complement the issues raised by today's visits. The first article was about and because it quoted him directly in the form of an interview, it was therefore by Noam Chomsky. Now Chomsky is hardly an ally of USA policy so it was not surprising that his views about Cambodia tend to favour critics of Nixon and Kissinger like Ben Kiernan. Asked if he blamed American bombing policy on the rise of the Khmer Rouge he seems to say he does although he does suggest that was not the only reason. Rather more directly he argues that Kissinger should be brought to trial not only for crimes in Cambodia but also for many other crimes unspecified.

In the same paper, there is a report that says the USA refuse to cancel the 'wartime debt' of Cambodia of $162 million dollars for cotton and other food items during the 1970's. This, I think, was when the USA interfered with Cambodian politics, put Lon Nol in power and bombed Cambodia. According to Ben Kiernan the USA dropped 2.76 million tons of bombs on Cambodia, caused $7 billion dollars worth of damage as well as killing 'tens of thousands of Cambodians. Somewhere some people have a very odd sense of debt, surely?