Event puts Khmer Rouge leaders on `trial'

(Photo: AP)

04/25/2011
Greg Mellen, Staff Writer
Long Beach Press Telegram (California, USA)

LONG BEACH - Residents are invited to a moot Khmer Rouge war crimes tribunal Saturday between noon and 4:30 p.m. at the Mark Twain Library, 1401 E. Anaheim St.

The Applied Social Research Institute of Cambodia, which was founded by medical sociologist Leakhena Nou, is playing host to the event. Her group helped collect survivor testimonies among Cambodian-American refugees that may be used in the tribunal.

Four surviving Khmer Rouge leaders - Nuon Chea, Ieng Sary, Ieng Thirith and Khieu Samphan - will be on trial. An estimated 2million Cambodians died during the Khmer Rouge reign between 1975 and 1979.

Khmer Rouge victims in U.S. to get their day in court

Survivors of the Khmer Rouge regime and their supporters pray for victims of the regime during a buddhist blessing ceremony at an informational event sponsored by advocates from Applied Social Research Institute of Cambodia (ASRIC) and The Center for Justice and Accountability (CJA) held at the Wat Khemara Rangsey Temple, in San Jose, Calif. on February 26, 2011. From the background left, Venerable Son Yeong Ratana and Venerable Pok Ngeth conduct the ceremony. (LiPo Ching/Mercury News)

At center, Kanphiry Keo, a survivor of the Khmer Rouge regime, whose parents and two brothers were killed by the regime watches a video on the crimes investigated by the Khmer Rouge court with other survivors and supporters at an informational event sponsored by advocates from Applied Social Research Institute of Cambodia (ASRIC) and The Center for Justice and Accountability (CJA) held at the Wat Khemara Rangsey Temple, in San Jose, Calif. on February 26, 2011. (LiPo Ching/Mercury News)

At left, Sophany Bay, a survivor of the Khmer Rouge regime, whose three children and other family members were killed by the regime speaks to survivors and supporters at an informational event sponsored by advocates from Applied Social Research Institute of Cambodia (ASRIC) and The Center for Justice and Accountability (CJA) held at the Wat Khemara Rangsey Temple, in San Jose, Calif. on February 26, 2011. From the background left, CJA Attorney Nushin Sarkarati holds a photo of Bay's child and CJA Legal Director Andrea Evans holds a photo of other members of Bay's family. (LiPo Ching/Mercury News)

Khun Aun, a survivor of the Khmer Rouge regime, holds a photo of her husband Keo Sophorn, who was killed by the regime at the Wat Khemara Rangsey Temple where survivors, supporters and advocates from Applied Social Research Institute of Cambodia (ASRIC) and The Center for Justice and Accountability (CJA) held an informational event, in San Jose, Calif. on February 26, 2011. (LiPo Ching/Mercury News)

02/26/2011
By John Boudreau
Mercury News (San Jose, California)

Many Cambodians have lived the lives of ghosts in Silicon Valley, not seen or heard from much, quietly tormented every day and every night with unbearable memories of the genocide that wiped out entire families -- parents, spouses, children, extended relatives.

Now, finally, some of them will have their day in international court. When the second trial of alleged perpetrators of the Khmer Rouge genocide begins in a few months, members of the Cambodian community in the United States will be represented by attorneys at the proceedings.

On Saturday, about 50 members of Silicon Valley's 10,000 strong sizable Cambodian community gathered at the Wat Khemara Rangsey Buddhist temple in East San Jose to hear about the upcoming trial of four senior Khmer Rouge leaders charged in connection with the deaths of 1.7 million people from execution, torture, starvation and disease from 1975 to 1979.

Genocide survivors seek justice

Rosan Ang of Santa Ana, left, bursts into tears when recalling the death of her husband and four children during the Khmer Rouge regime. She shares her story to help preserve history during a two-day workshop held by the Applied Social Research Institute of Cambodia in Santa Ana. Kieng Seng is the interpreter. (Photo: CINDY YAMANAKA, THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER)

Saturday, September 19, 2009
BY COURTNEY PERKES
The Orange County Register (California, USA)

Cambodian survivors of the Khmer Rouge submit testimony for court.

SANTA ANA Rosan Ang never saw her husband or four oldest children again after the Khmer Rouge seized them more than 30 years ago. But on Saturday she finally caught a glimpse of justice.

Ang, 67, wiped tears as she recounted the horror of losing her family at The Cambodian Family, part of a national effort to collect information from survivors for the upcoming international justice tribunal trial of four Khmer Rouge leaders.

Audrey Redmond, a Washington, D.C., attorney, gently asked Ang what happened after the Khmer Rouge took control of Cambodia in 1975. Under dictator Pol Pot, roughly 2 million Cambodians were starved, murdered or worked to death.

"They sent us to live in the forest," said Ang, who lives in Santa Ana. "They separated my children. Only my youngest daughter survived because she was too young (to work) and she stayed with me."

Her husband went back and forth from a work camp. One day, he was tied up and taken away. She never saw him again.

As Ang spoke, Redmond patted her arm and took notes for the court's victim information form. She said the Cambodia-based tribunal is not obligated to use the information in the trial, but may choose to. The tribunal, which is currently trying one leader, is comprised of Cambodian legal officials as well as an international group from the United Nations.

More than a dozen survivors of the Khmer Rouge's brutal four-year reign attended the first day of a two-day workshop put on by the nonprofit Applied Social Research Institute of Cambodia. They came to tell their stories for the legal system in their native country and also for the archives at New York University.

"They've been silent for 34 years," said Leakhena Nou, founder of the research institute and a sociology professor at Cal State Long Beach. "Now is the time to break the silence."

Volunteer Kenneth Long, a 30-year-old chemical engineer from Long Beach, thanked the group for having the courage to share their experience so that his generation would not forget. During a lunch break, he described hearing his father recount the pain he lived through for submission to the tribunal.

"It was the first time I'd ever seen him break down," Long said. "All his friends were wiped out. He was studying to be a lawyer. They killed his professors, his classmates."

Collecting the stories and filling out the official paperwork for submission to the court can take anywhere from two to eight hours.

"I had an interview with a woman the day before yesterday and she was systematically gang raped by three Khmer Rouge soldiers from morning to nightfall while she was six-and-a-half months pregnant," Nou said. "She was left to die at the rice paddy."

Nou also gave the survivors a presentation on post traumatic stress disorder. She showed photos of victims who were put to death and asked the group how they felt seeing them.

"My name was on the list of people targeted for execution but I escaped," responded 72-year-old Samien Thong of Arizona.

The testimonies will continue at 10:30 a.m. Sunday at The Cambodian Family in Santa Ana.

Contact the writer: 714-796-3686 or cperkes@ocregister.com

Cambodians seek justice

Cambodians Kim San, left, Sun Dary and Sokyoom Kem listen to Dr. Leakhena Nou explain how they can provide testimony for the war crime tribunals. Nou, a Cal State Long Beach professor, founded the Applied Social Research Institute of Cambodia. (Diandra Jay/Staff Photographer)

03/23/2009
By Greg Mellen Staff Writer
Long Beach Press Telegram (California, USA)

LONG BEACH - For decades, one of the debilitating fallouts for survivors of the Cambodian genocide has been their feelings of helplessness and powerlessness as victims.

A professor at Cal State Long Beach is trying to change that by giving Cambodians the opportunity to give testimony that could be used in the U.N.-backed Khmer Rouge tribunals being conducted in Cambodia.

Dr. Leakhena Nou, a medical sociologist at CSULB, is making it her mission to get the word out. And she's doing it one person and one community group at a time. One day it's at the United Cambodian Community. Another it's at McBride Park. A session in Orange County is planned. The more groups, the more testimonies, the better.

"It's a matter of human rights," Nou says of victims speaking out. "They have a right to be part of truth and reconciliation for their suffering and for their own healing."

And while justice may only seem symbolic and too-long delayed, Nou feels it is vital for healing and empowerment for the survivors and the generations that follow.

Nou typically starts by asking groups how many of them were victims of the Khmer Rouge, how many have bad dreams, how many would like justice.

The hands go up, the stories often gush forth.

An elderly Cambodian tells how she lost her entire family to atrocities. Another tells of her husband being pulled from a rice paddy and led to his execution. Another tells of losing 10 children. The stories emerge, each as heart-rending as the next.

For years these victims have mourned the dead but felt powerless to do anything about it. They still suffer from nightmares, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder.

Aaron Va works with the Asian and Pacific Islander Older Adults Task Force. Like Va, the people in his group are survivors. He says all have stories they want to tell but don't know where to go. And they still fear consequences of speaking out.

On Friday at 10 a.m. at McBride Park, genocide survivors will have a chance to fill out information forms and provide testimonials that will be forwarded to the victims' unit of the Extraordinary Chambers of the Courts of Cambodia, which is overseeing the trials.

If there is enough interest, more opportunities will be offered.

Last Wednesday, Nou and a pair of associates attended a Women's Health Forum at the UCC, and on Monday they met with the Asian and Pacific Islander group.

Each time, planned short presentations unfurled into long discussions followed by question-and-answer sessions about the roles of victims in the tribunals.

All victims and relatives of victims of acts of genocide during the Khmer Rouge reign between April 17, 1975, and Jan. 6, 1979, have the right to file complaints that will be brought to the ECCC.

Through a program called the Cambodian Diaspora Victims' Participation Project, Nou's nonprofit group - Applied Social Research Institute of Cambodia - and the Asian Pacific American Institute are gathering victim statements that could become part of the official court proceedings.

Law students and translators will help victims fill out official information forms.

However, time is short as the courts recently announced they will only take complaints for a limited time.

Sean Butler, an attorney helping Nou and her group, said a program has been set up to make it easier for victims to fill out the forms.

"This may be the only opportunity you have (to participate in the trial)," Butler told the crowd.

The first tribunal in Cambodia is currently under way against Kaing Geuk Eav, also known as Duch, who allegedly oversaw the mass torture and execution in prison camps, including Cambodia's notorious Tuol Sleng, or S-21, camp.

A second trial is slated for alleged Khmer Rouge leaders Noun Chea, Khieu Samphan, Ieng Sary and Ieng Thirith. The court will stop taking complaints 10 days before the second trial, which has not been scheduled.

It is unknown if there will be any more trials or defendants in the perennially cash-strapped courts.

Victims have two avenues to provide testimony. One is as a civil party, but that requires legal representation in Cambodia and could require travel to participate in the trials. The second avenue, which is free and the one Nou and Butler are assisting in, is for complainants who want to get their stories on the record without being required to testify.

Butler stressed that testimony is voluntary. However, he added that defense attorneys have the right to contact complainants.

And that's what worries some of the elders, who still fear retribution for having their names on the record.

One man worried he'd be targeted when he returned to Cambodia if he testified. Others were mistrustful of the proceedings.

Butler said the best defense for the victims was to testify in large numbers. Similar efforts are being organized in Lowell, Mass., Portland, Ore., Virginia, Chicago and elsewhere. However, Butler could not guarantee absolute safety from threats.

Joshua Bender, who is helping Nou, told the group that his family was victimized by the Nazi Holocaust.

"What helped me understand what happened to my family is the stories and the testimony of my grandparents," Bender said. "Because they had the courage to tell their stories, my community can keep its traditions. I hope through your courage your grandchildren can understand."

"We hope courage comes in large numbers and can help to heal the scars," Butler said.

People interested in testifying and groups with survivors who would like to become involved can contact ASRIC on-line at www.apa.nyu.edu under research and special projects or by calling Nou at 562-985-7439.

greg.mellen@presstelegram.com, 562-499-1291

US Cambodian Seeks to Unite Victims

Leakhena Nou (Photo: AP)

By Taing Sarada, VOA Khmer
Original report from Washington
03 April 2008

Nou Leakhena founded the Applied Social Research Institute of Cambodia as a way to bring Cambodians together, to help them heal, and teach them to trust .

Working with those traumatized by the brutality of Cambodia's wars, the Khmer Rouge or the current government, Nou Leakhena , who is Cambodian-American, is slowly building a community of understanding, healing, and, she hopes, justice.

The Institute is also compiling data on trauma suffered by Cambodians.

"The root of the problem is that the people themselves don’t trust each other, even the Khmer people in America," Nou Leakhena, PhD, said in a recent interview. "The key factor for the local Khmer people in seeking justice is whether they should be united between Khmer and Khmer and build up strong solidarity among each other, then demand justice by itself before asking for assistantce from outside.”

The Institute is recording information from victims of the Khmer Rouge, and helping people identify whether, under the laws of the Khmer Rouge tribunal in Phnom Penh, they are victims.

The Institute held a forum in March that gathered around 100 participants, who shared their experiences and testimonies.

"It is our belief that the testimonials given will not only benefit the mental health of the participants in the immediate and long term, but they will also help provide critical evidence to be used in the prosecuting Khmer Rouge leaders in captivity," Nou Leakhena said.

The Institute not only wanted to help tribunal proceedings, but to assist modern Cambodia.

"There are all kinds of human rights violations happening in Cambodia now," she said. "The powerful and rich violate the poor and the powerless."

Koy Saveun, a participant for the Institute's March forum, said the gathering was important to help him "clearly identify what justice is."

"Before you seek justice in society, you had better seek justice from yourself and your family," he said.