Cambodia - S-21 RESTITUTION EXTORTION (2of10) [KH&EN]

As to legal procedures, this issue remains complicated and intricate, because there is so much involved concerning certain countries, including powerful ones. For example, Mr Benson Samay, Defense lawyer for Ta Mok, in his interview on television, stated that "....Ta Mok will implicate people, including U.S. Secretary of State (Henry Kissinger) based upon existing documents...and leaders of certain countries...."

The richest source of documentation for the study of democratic Kampuchea, and at the same time its most sinister legacy, is in the files of the center of interrogations of Tuol Sleng, known as S-21, including/understanding some four thousand confessions extorted of 1975 to 1979. The center occupied the buildings of an old college of the southern district of Phnom Penh. It is estimated that between the end of 1975 and the beginning of 1979 more than 20,000 men, women and children were imprisoned in S-21. With some rare exceptions, all were questioned there, tortured then killed. In 1975, the number of recorded prisoners did not exceed 200.

In 1976, there were ten times of them more (2,250), and in 1977, not less than 6,000. Although the files concerning 1978 are incomplete, it is probable that nearly 10,000 people were imprisoned this year. Not more than one half-dozen are come out from it alive; for a reason unknown, the alternative imprisonment or "rehabilitation", usually used in China and in communist Vietnam, never was seriously considered in democratic Kampuchea.

The four thousand confessions found in S-21 are obviously not very amusing reading. Some make only three or four pages. Others are true files of several hundreds of pages. Invariably, they recognize crimes against the party, often in the form of a membership of services of foreign information. These confessions take as a starting point the preceding Soviet of the purging and Stalinist lawsuits by the Thirties, and the faked lawsuits of communist frameworks in Eastern Europe the shortly after the Second World war. Undoubtedly judging that the purging of the Thirties had made it possible to Stalin to ensure his influence on the party, the Kampuchean communist leaders used the same methods to be maintained with the capacity the historian who examines these files runs up against several obstacles. The first is its emotional reaction vis-a-vis so much of pain, with so much of cruelty, the destruction of so much of innocent lives.

The richest source of documentation for the study of democratic Kampuchea, and at the same time its most sinister legacy, is in the files of the center of interrogations of Tuol Sleng, known as S-21, including/understanding some four thousand confessions extorted of 1975 to 1979. The center occupied the buildings of an old college of the southern district of Phnom Penh. It is estimated that between the end of 1975 and the beginning of 1979 more than 20 000 men, women and children were imprisoned in S-21. With some rare exceptions, all were questioned there, tortured then killed. In 1975, the number of recorded prisoners did not exceed 200.

In 1976, there were ten times of them more (2 250), and in 1977, not less than 6 000. Although the files concerning 1978 are incomplete, it is probable that nearly 10 000 people were imprisoned this year. Not more than one half-dozen are come out from it alive; for a reason unknown, the alternative imprisonment or "rehabilitation", usually used in China and in communist Vietnam, never was seriously considered in democratic Kampuchea.

The four thousand confessions found in S-21 are obviously not very amusing reading. Some make only three or four pages. Others are true files of several hundreds of pages. Invariably, they recognize crimes against the party, often in the form of a membership of services of foreign information. These confessions take as a starting point the preceding Soviet of the purging and Stalinist lawsuits by the Thirties, and the faked lawsuits of communist frameworks in Eastern Europe the shortly after the Second World war. Undoubtedly judging that the purging of the Thirties had made it possible to Stalin to ensure his influence on the party, the Kampuchean communist leaders used the same methods to be maintained with the capacity the historian who examines these files runs up against several obstacles. The first is its emotional reaction vis-a-vis so much of pain, with so much of cruelty, the destruction of so much of innocent lives.

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• Kampuchea
• Khmer
• Rouge
• Yuon
• Angkar
• Toul
• Sleng

[Bouchon211]

This is so sad I feel so sorry this man :(

[seanseng61]

til now I still don't know how my dad died. We have 7 people in our family only me that was survived. I was born in phnom penh. building in capital city.

[silverunicorns777]

man had dominated man to his injury .

:quoted from the [bible]