A survey reports that Cambodians still know little about the Khmer Rouge tribunal

Prosrae Leu (Cambodia, Kampong Cham). 10/10/2006. The Khmer Institute for Democracy (KID) provides villages with information on the criminal tribunal. (Photo: John Vink/ Magnum)

21-01-2009
By Stéphanie Gée
Ka-set in English

The Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) will be the last and only hope for victims of the Khmer Rouge regime to receive formal acknowledgement and recognition of the grave injustices and losses they have suffered in the past. But the establishment of the hybrid court generated considerable expectations among Cambodians... This emphasised the need to make sure the population is well-informed about ongoing procedures and that they understand what is at stake as well as the limits of the ECCC. Researchers for the Initiative for Vulnerable Populations, a section of the Human Rights Centre at the University of Berkeley, California, came to Cambodia in September 2008 with in mind the idea of sounding out the population in order to assess inhabitants' knowledge of the ECCC, their level of access to this type of information and their desire for justice and reparations. The results of the survey were compiled in a booklet and presented in Phnom Penh on Wednesday January 21st under the title “So We Will Never Forget”.

The court still has to spread the word about its activities
Among 1,000 Cambodians randomly selected in 125 communes of Cambodia, 39% of the respondents had “no knowledge” of the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC), 46% only had “limited knowledge” and 15% had “some level of knowledge”, the new report says. When asked to give details about the number of persons who have been arrested and were awaiting trial at the time of the survey, only 10% were able to give the right answer: five. And when asked to name the five accused, only 3% of the respondents gave the right answer. However, more than half of the polled adequately described the ECCC as a “hybrid court”.

Beyond knowledge of the ECCC, that of the Khmer Rouge regime is equally problematic, especially for those born after the regime. Today, nearly thirty years after the end of Democratic Kampuchea, two thirds (68%) of the population of Cambodia are 29 years-old or younger and suffer from incommensurable lack of knowledge on that black chapter of their country's history, when 84% said they learned what they know on the subject from family and friends. And even though the desire to know more is felt - the majority of respondents reckon it is not too late to learn about this period of history - limited knowledge of what happened under the Khmer Rouge regime can have a deep impact on the meaning that Cambodians will give to the procedure before the ECCC.

Strengthening the dissemination of information
Only 4 out of 1,000 Cambodians who lived under the Khmer Rouge regime took part in some activity linked with the ECCC in the year preceding the interview, when 64% claim they never heard anything about the court during the month before the survey. Since 2007, many NGOs have been leading outreach activities about the tribunal throughout the country, encouraging victim participation. As of November 2008, the ECCC Victims Unit had received 2,500 complaints and civil party applications.

“What often happens [with tribunals in charge of international crimes] is that the money does not go to outreach programmes when it is so important that the people understand what is happening and that their expectations are high. They need to be educated as much as possible”, says Eric Stover, one of authors behind the survey report.

Positive perceptions towards the ECCC
Generally speaking, Cambodian respondents gave the ECCC very good marks. About two thirds believed that ECCC judges would be fair and / or that the ECCC is neutral. Almost three quarters of them agreed with the statement that the ECCC would bring justice to Khmer Rouge regime victims and /or their families. They defined their idea of “justice” as “establishing truth” (43%) and “being fair” (37%). In addition, 71% believed the ECCC would help rebuild trust in Cambodia and 67% believed it would help promote national reconciliation.

Almost half of all the respondents claimed they were uncomfortable interacting with former members of the Khmer Rouge regime in various situations, whether within the same community or in the same household. A vast majority – four of those surveyed out of five - said they still harboured feelings of hatred towards Khmer Rouge members responsible for violent acts. More than 70% said they wanted to see the Khmer Rouge suffer in some way and a third said they wished they could take revenge. Only a third of respondents said they had forgiven the Khmer Rouge. “The past has not been buried”, another author of the report, Patrick Vinck, insists.

Besides, it appears that a majority of the respondents do not trust the Cambodian criminal justice system: they mentioned the high cost of going to court and the payment of kickbacks, which led the authors of this snapshot survey to stress that “the way Cambodians perceive the national court system may in turn affect how they view the ECCC”.

Another element was emphasised in the report: apparently, daily preoccupations prevail over the need for justice. Indeed, 83% of those polled said their priority was to find a job, and three out of four declared it was more important to focus on problems that Cambodians face in their daily lives than address crimes committed during the Khmer Rouge regime. In the meantime, nine out of ten respondents in the survey said that members of the Khmer Rouge should be held accountable for the crimes they committed, and half of them specified their answer by mentioning Khmer Rouge leaders or officials. When asked who would be in charge of holding these individuals accountable, the ECCC only get 9% of answers against 58% for the current Cambodian government.

Reparations for all
As for reparations of a collective, symbolic and moral nature provided by the ECCC, 53% said they should be in a form that affects the daily lives of Cambodians: 26% stated that support for agriculture and farming should be provided, 23% mentioned the development of social services, 22% mentioned financial support and 17% asked that those who were responsible for the violence be punished. A majority of those surveyed said that reparations should be provided to a community as a whole. But who will have to pay for all that? 64% stated “the government”, 22% said “the Khmer Rouge leaders” and 10% said “the international community”.

Recommendations to the ECCC?
Respondents were given the opportunity to make one recommendation to the criminal court. More than a third of those who lived under the Khmer Rouge regime recommended that the ECCC speed up trials, when in September 2008, the opening of the first trial (Duch's trial) was still in limbo. Slightly more than 20% recommended that the ECCC be fair and independent, and 11% said that the tribunal should punish those who committed atrocities during Pol Pot's regime.

As for the authors of the survey report themselves, they call the ECCC to immediately and effectively deal with allegations of corruption and lack of transparency, to greatly expand their outreaching efforts and communication, and to work together with the Cambodian Ministry of Education to create educational material on that theme for use in primary and secondary schools. To donors and the civil society, they suggested they find ways to help the ECCC better inform Cambodians about its mandate and activities, to help define what reparations would work better in the Cambodian context and to promote discussion in communities where tensions with former Khmer Rouge members are still high. Finally, the authors encourage the government to conduct a major review and overhaul of the national criminal justice system that integrates the judicial legacy of the ECCC, to end corruption and continue to work with the civil society to integrate what happened during the Khmer Rouge regime into schools' History curriculum, since “Cambodia's school system has thus far failed to educate young people about the crimes of the Khmer Rouge regime”.
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A survey meant to be continued

If they find new fundings, the authors of the report - Phuong Pham, Patrick Vinck, Mychelle Balthazard, Sokhom Hean et Eric Stover – will repeat their survey, at least after the holding of the first trial and before the end of the whole process. Their goal is to give a voice to survivors of mass murder and study attitudes towards peace, justice and social reconstruction, as well as advising the main protagonists in the process by giving them snapshots of the population's needs, taken during different periods of time, on account of the evolution of opinions.
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Avoiding to create expectations if they are to be deceived

Eric Stover estimates it is dangerous to create a civil parties programme within the ECCC when funds are not sufficient. “It creates great expectations and there is no way to fulfil them. It is a serious problem. It would be terrible to stop it now. And again, it all comes down to funding...” “Judging by the number of victims in the country, this is a challenge”, his colleague Patrick Vinck added.
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Cambodians in favour of the ECCC, according to prior surveys

Several surveys conducted before 2006 showed strong support of the population for the establishment of the ECCC, as pointed out in the report “So We Will Never Forget”. A survey by the Open Society Justice Initiative in 2005 found that 62% of respondents favoured the establishment of the court. In February 2008, i.e. nineteen months after the establishment of the court, the International Republican Institute (IRI) found that 71% of Cambodians were aware of the court and 69% supported trials of top Khmer Rouge leaders. And in October 2008, a survey conducted among Cambodians by the Khmer Institute for Democracy (KID) showed that 94% of them supported ECCC trials.