Genocide In Cambodia

In 1975, the Communist Party “Khmer Rouge”, led by genocidal tyrant Pol Pot, overtook Cambodia with a plan, to create a Socialist agricultural society and mow down anyone who opposed. The opposition, however, was already determined by the Khmer Rouge. Anyone who was a minority, religious, handicapped, and/or well-educated were declared the enemies of the state. The Khmer Rouge spent four years, from 1975 to 1979, violating human rights declared by the United Nations in 1949. They committed the irrational murder of nearly two million people, and forced of them and many others to slave away on massive collectivized farms.

In the years preceding the Cambodian Genocide, Cambodia had been somewhat unstable. In 1953, Cambodia, a rather small country

Thus, The Khmer Rouge arbitrarily forced people into labor camps and prison, based on that the citizens had committed no crimes. Therefore, the Khmer Rouge have committed additional crimes against humanity by subjecting Cambodians to arbitrary arrest and detention.

The base article of the Declaration of Human Rights is Article 3 which states “Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.” The Khmer Rouge murdered over two million Cambodian men, women, and children. The genocide of nearly two million Cambodian people is the foremost reason as to why the Khmer Rouge are criminals to the human race. The Khmer Rouge have committed crimes against humanity by committing the genocide of Cambodian

Many of the Khmer Rouge fled the country into Thailand, and would continue to live in the jungle between Thailand and Cambodia. By 1989, Vietnam had totally withdrawn from Cambodia, and the conditions in Cambodia began to be restored to how they were under Prince Sihanouk’s first command, land became legal to own and Buddhism became the state religion. In 1995, mass graves of victims were discovered, the bones now preserved in the somber memorials in the killing fields where they were discovered.

Since 2007, only three members of the Khmer Rouge have been indicted for their crimes, all found guilty and serving life sentences. Five were tried, one deemed mentally unfit to stand trial, and one died during trial process. The five were indicted (not convicted) for a combined seven crimes of genocide, fifty-four crimes against humanity, and thirty-one war