Khmer Rouge Survivors Expose Their Tortuous Past

WONG:
Cambodian artists expose their tortuous life as prisoners under the Khmer Rouge. During Pol Pots regime one and a half million civilians were killed or died of starvation. And thousands died in prison. Here is the story of the handful that survived.

STORY:
Van Nath is one of four, out of twenty thousand, who survived from the Khmer Rouge Tuol Seng prison. A trained artist, he now exhibits his paintings on prison life to the younger generation, so they may not forget Pol Pot's crimes.

Currently, he is part of 'The Art of Survival" exhibition at the capital's Meta House Gallery. Nath is also a writer and human rights activist.

[Van Nath, Artist and Prison Survivor]:(male, Khmer)
"If I compare the prison where I was [Tuol Seng prison] to Nuon Chea prison, it is now very different. This prison is very good. They have televisions, electricity, mattresses and they have enough food to eat. But at Tuol Seng, I was in handcuffs 24 hours a day with no food and no medicine. Now even with today's good prisons, prisoners can still ask to be released on bail. They complain that they can not stay there. But what about me and the nearly 20,000 people who were imprisoned at Tuol Seng?"

Another artist Chhim Sothy is also taking part in this historical exhibition.

[Chhim Sothy, Exhibiting Artist]: ( khmer)
"After we agreed to do the exhibition about the Khmer Rouge regime, I started to collect materials stored at my house, in order to make a piece of art that would have the full meaning of what happened to me at the time."

The gallery owner hopes the show will help visitors to speak openly about their country's painful past.

[Nicolas Mesterharm, Gallery Owner]: (male, khmer)
"The young generation we work with knows a little bit, so we try to educate them and we try to bring young and older artists together. We try to address the genocide issue and the Khmer Rouge atrocities through art within the society that has not learnt yet to speak openly about what happened 25 years ago."

The exhibition comes at a time when Cambodia and the United Nations are trying senior members of the Khmer Rouge for genocide.

Edited by - english on 01/28/2008 09:38:13

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[TOMP66666]

Many pro-communist peace activists make dead wrong argument that millions of Vietnamese would be saved without the Vietnam war given the fact that millions of Vietnamese lost their lives in "re-education" camps and at sea on their journey for freedom after 1975; not mentioning two milliions of Cambodians executed by Khmer Rouge backed by China. In fact, Vietnam war is an ideological war between capitalism and communism like the current Afghanistan war is a war between democracy and terrorism.

[BlazinLy]

I'm glad that even though people out there are ignorant towards us Khmers. We as Cambodians know the real story and the true sorrow stories told by our own parents and families. American culture does not reflect the Khmer Rouge but rather other stuff. We know what real suffer is.

[niggangam]

the Khmer Rouge Regime was defiantly a horrific time is history, but again many Americans dont realize the events of the regime. they think the Taliban, the Nazis were so bad but its just not as bad as what happened during the Khmer Rouge. American classrooms aren;t stressing it enough to students, it can be something that can have life long lessons so that American Children dtake things for granted, but we all know they do...

[hexepepper]

Kmer Rouge, worse than the Nazis, worse than the Taliban, worse than the Israelis.

[khmergul4ever]

woww! he's a great artist

[Opequi]

Congratulations for the move!

[thembrickkids]

great way to teach people through pictures