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Perspectives on memory, forgiveness and reconciliation in Cambodia's post-Khmer Rouge society

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 October 2019

Phuong N. Pham ,
Mychelle Balthazard ,
Niamh Gibbons  and
Patrick Vinck
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Abstract

Transitional justice is a conspicuous feature of responses to mass atrocities. Rooted in accountability and redress for victims, transitional justice mechanisms influence and are influenced by collective memory of conflicts. This article looks at the dynamics between memory, trauma and forgiveness in Cambodia. Thirty years after the Khmer Rouge regime, Cambodians expressed limited knowledge of the past, a strong desire for the truth, and lingering feelings of hatred. The Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) created or renewed demand for truth, along with some desire for harm to come to the wrongdoers. Although the ECCC was set up several decades after the mass atrocities, the data suggest that the ECCC and the civil society movement associated with it may have had positive outcomes on addressing the legacy of the violence.

Keywords

memoryCambodiaKhmer Rougeforgivenessreconciliation
Type
Reconciliation and (re)writing history: What to remember
Information
International Review of the Red Cross , Volume 101 , Issue 910: Memory and war , April 2019 , pp. 125 - 149
Copyright
Copyright © icrc 2019 

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References

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39 L. McGrew, above note 34.

40 Ibid.

41 Ibid.

42 Ibid.

43 Munyas, Burca, “Genocide in the Minds of Cambodian Youth: Transmitting (Hi)Stories of Genocide to Second and Third Generations in Cambodia”, Journal of Genocide Research, Vol. 10, No. 3, 2008CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

44 In the aftermath of the conflict, outside countries and institutions supported factions with different ideologies. The Soviet Union allied with the Vietnamese; China, the United States and the Association of South-East Asia supported the resistance movement; and the United Nations recognized Democratic Kampuchea (Khmer Rouge) as the representative of Cambodia. The country was isolated for at least ten years. It is only at the beginning of the 1990s that the United Nations got involved in Cambodia facilitating the 1993 elections. See John D. Ciorciari, “History and Politics: Behind the Khmer Rouge Trials”, in J. D. Ciorciari and A. Heindel (eds), above note 31, Chap. 1; C. Etcheson, above note 9, pp. 17–30; E. Gottesman, above note 25, pp 42–45.

45 See note 23 above.

46 During the first stage, researchers randomly selected 125 out of 1,621 communes using systematic random sampling proportionate to size. During the second stage, researchers randomly selected two villages from each of the selected communes using simple random sampling. Within each village, four households were randomly selected using linear systematic sampling with equal probability of selection. Finally, during the fourth stage, within each household, a Kish grid was used to select one household member at random for an interview.

47 In the questions, the definition of knowledge and how they talk about the events was left up to the interviewee.

48 The Cambodian legal system is based on civil law, which allows victims to participate in legal proceedings. Following Cambodian law, the ECCC also allows victims to participate in its proceedings as CPs or complainants. See ECCC, Internal Rules, Rev. 8, as revised on 3 August 2011, Rule 23(1), available at: https://tinyurl.com/y4ys9myo.

49 Prior to its use in the study, the instrument was back-translated into English to ensure comparability.

50 The ECCC has had four main cases. Case 001 was the first case and as such was a landmark in the pursuit of justice, according to international standards, for the crimes committed during the KR regime. The defendant, Kaing Guek Eav alias Duch, was the chairman of the notorious central Tuol Sleng prison and its branches in Phnom Penh. During the KR regime, he oversaw the imprisonment, torture and execution of more than 12,000 people. Duch, found guilty of crimes against humanity and war crimes, was convicted to life imprisonment. Case 002 involved two KR leaders, Nuon Chea and Khieu Samphan. This case covers several sites across country, and diverse charges including genocide against the Cham and the Vietnamese, and forced marriage. The ECCC handed down a judgment in Case 002/02 in November 2018, and Cases 003 and 004 are still in progress. See ECCC, “Case Load”, available at: www.eccc.gov.kh/en/case-load. See also P. N. Pham et al., “Victim Participation in the Trial of Duch”, above note 23; N. Kirchenbauer et al., above note 23.

51 The initial hearing started on 27 June 2011. The substantive part of the trial commenced on 21 November 2011; see: www.eccc.gov.kh/en/case/topic/119.

52 To speed up proceedings, and considering the advanced age of the accused, the Trial Chamber ordered the severance of Case 002 into several sub-trials. See ECCC, “Severance Order Pursuant to Internal Rule 89ter”, 22 September 2011, paras 1, 5, available at: www.eccc.gov.kh/en/document/court/severance-order-pursuant-internal-rule-89ter.

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54 69% of respondents in 2008 and 72% in 2010 had lived under the KR; 31% and 27% in 2008 and 2010 respectively were born after the regime had left power. See P. N. Pham et al., So We Will Never Forget, above note 23; P. N. Pham et al., above note 1.

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60 B. Munyas above note 43.

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63 N. Kirchenbauer et al., above note 23.

64 In the 2010 survey, 47% of respondents had seen TV programmes about the ECCC; among those, 46% said they had specifically seen Duch on Trial, which in part talked about events during the KR regime. More than 31,000 people attended hearings during the Duch trial, and several thousand watched the trial on television. ECCC Public Affairs Section, “Outreach Work”, presentation at the ICTJ Workshop on Outreach, Phnom Penh, Cambodia, 3–5 March 2010; Brendan Brady, “Lights, Camera, Genocide!”, Public Radio International, 2009, available at: www.genocidewatch.org/images/Cambodia_09_11_20_Lights_camera_genocide.doc.

65 N. Kirchenbauer et al., above note 23.

66 Caitlin McCaffrie, Somaly Kum, Daniel Mattes and Lina Tay, “‘So We Can Know What Happened’: The Educational Potential of the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia”, WSD HANDA Center for Human Rights and International Justice at Stanford University and the East-West Center, 2018.

67 These projects include the institution of a National Remembrance Day, a Public Memorials Initiative, construction of a memorial in Phnom Penh to honour victims of forced evacuations, testimonial therapy, self-help groups, permanent exhibitions in five provinces to educate the public about the KR, and several educational projects. Open Society Justice Initiative, above note 37, p. 24.

68 Through the years, several NGOs and individuals have provided information on the KR regime through radio programmes, mobile exhibits, and films about or visits to the ECCC or memorials. See, for example, ibid., pp. 74–77; ECCC, “Victims Support Section”, available at: www.eccc.gov.kh/en/organs/victims-support-section. In 2019–21, DC-Cam will continue to promote memory, justice and reconciliation through different projects. See, for example, DC-Cam, “Responding to the Cambodian Genocide in a Global Context: Strategic Plan 2019–20121”, available at: http://d.dccam.org/Abouts/Annual/pdf/DC-Cam_Strategic_Vision_2019-2021_panel.pdf.

69 Open Society Justice Initiative, above note 37, p. 90.

70 ECCC Agreement and ECCC Internal Rules, above note 1.

71 Rieff, David, In Praise of Forgetting: Historical Memory and Its Ironies, Yale University Press, New Haven, CT, 2016, p. 160Google Scholar. See also David Rieff's article in this issue of the Review.

72 Craig Etcheson, “Reconciliation in Cambodia: Theory and Practice”, Cambodia, 2004. On file with authors.

73 P. N. Pham et al., above note 1, p. 33.

74 To be accepted as CPs, applicants had to demonstrate a direct link between being harmed and at least one of the crimes alleged against the charged person. See ECCC Internal Rules, Rev. 8, above note 48, Rule 23 bis.

75 P. N. Pham et al., above note 1.

76 Logistic regression is similar to linear regression except that the outcome variable is a binary categorical variable. In this particular analysis the outcome variable is whether the KR regime is forgiven (yes) or not (no). One of the results calculated from logistic regression is odds ratios for statistically significant predictors (i.e., variables that are associated with or predict whether someone has forgiven the KR regime or not).

77 B. Munyas, above note 43.

78 B. Hamber, above note 11, p. 5.

79 Yathay, Pin, “A Brief Description of the Society under DK”, in Khmer Rouge History & Authors: From Stalin to Pol Pot – Towards a Description of the Pol Pot Regime, ADHOC and Center for Social Development, Phnom Penh, January 2007Google Scholar; M. Vickery, above note 21, pp. 81–82.

80 Stover, Eric, Balthazard, Mychelle and Koenig, K. Alexa, “Confronting Duch: Civil Party Participation in Case 001 at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia”, International Review of the Red Cross, Vol. 93, No. 882, 2011CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also Kiza, Ernesto, Rathgeber, Corene and Rohne, Holger C., Victims of War: An Empirical Study on War-Victimization and Victims’́ Attitudes towards Addressing Atrocities, Hamburger Edition Online, Hamburg, 2006, p. 60Google Scholar.

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82 See above note 59.

83 At the Women's Hearings, many women spoke openly about gender-based violence committed during the KR regime. Cambodian Defenders Project, Women's Hearing: True Voices Of Women under the Khmer Rouge. Report on the Proceedings of the 2011 Women's Hearing on Sexual Violence under the Khmer Rouge Regime, Phnom Penh, May 2012, available at: gbvkr.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/Report-on-2011-Womens-Hearing_Phnom-Penh.pdf.

84 For further discussion on the limits of forgiveness as a transitional justice goal, see R. Saunders, above note 8.

85 K. Dy, above note 57.

86 See above note 67.

87 ECCC Trial Chamber, “Summary of Judgment: Case 002/02”, Case No. 002/19-09-2007/ECCC/TC, 16 November 2018, available at: www.eccc.gov.kh/en/document/court/summary-judgement-case-00202-against-nuon-chea-and-khieu-samphan.

88 Cases 003 and 004 are still in progress, but the charged persons are considered by the ECCC to be “most responsible” and not KR leaders. See ECCC, “Case Load”, available at: www.eccc.gov.kh/en/case-load. Nuon Chea died on 4 August 2019; any further legal proceedings will continue with Khieu Samphan only. See ECCC, “Accused Person Nuon Chea Dies”, available at: www.eccc.gov.kh/en/articles/accused-person-nuon-chea-dies.

89 See, for example, DC-Cam, above note 67.

90 Leonie Kijewski, “Khmer Rouge Tribunal/Khmer Rouge Leaders Committed Genocide of Minorities, International Tribunal Finds”, Southeast Asia Globe, 16 November 2018, https://sea-globe.com/khmer-rouge-leaders-committed-genocide-of-minorities-international-tribunal-finds/.

91 Hannah Beech, “Khmer Rouge's Slaughter in Cambodia Is Ruled a Genocide”, The New York Times, 15 November 2018, available at: https://tinyurl.com/y2uahcvj.

92 See, for example, “Khmer Rouge Verdict: ‘I Live Next to My Torturer’”, BBC News, 16 November 2018, available at: www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-46233582; “Khmer Rouge Leaders Found Guilty of Cambodia Genocide”, BBC News, 16 November 2018, available at: www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-46217896; Sok Khemara, “Mixed Views on Khmer Rouge Tribunal Impact, Legacy Ahead of Genocide Verdict”, VOA Khmer, 16 November 2018, available at: www.voacambodia.com/a/mixed-views-on-khmer-rouge-tribunal-impact-legacy-ahead-of-genocide-verdict/4660156.html.