The forced transfers

 

As residents of Phnom Penh, my family was forced to leave their home and take an uncertain journey to their native village in Prey Veng, a province in southeastern Cambodia.Amid fear and confusion, they joined the crowds of evacuees trudging along Monivong Boulevard towards National Road 1 in an attempt to reach their destination.Travelling on foot with their few belongings strapped to a motorbike, they slept wherever they could find a spot when night fell.My mother recalls that one evening, without realising it, the family slept through the night atop dead bodies of evacuees.Instead of ending their journey in Prey Veng as planned, my family was redirected to Kampong Cham province, where my mother’s family lived and where my family remained throughout the Khmer Rouge regime. 

Labelled as “new” people or “April 17” people, they were assigned to live with “base” people, those who had previously lived in zones under Khmer Rouge control and who were considered more trustworthy.My family was assigned to work in the fields, growing rice and collecting rubber. My parents were placed in separate work units, while my brothers, ages four and seven, were assigned to a children’s unit.The violence that engulfed Cambodia during the Khmer Rouge years has had a constant impact on our family and on Cambodian society ever since. Cambodia endured five years of civil war from 1970 to 1975.The country then fell into the hands of Khmer Rouge revolutionaries, who ruled the country from April 17, 1975, to January 7, 1979. 

The Khmer Rouge officially renamed the country Democratic Kampuchea (DK) and embarked on policies and practices marked by widespread violence.Before the Khmer Rouge captured Phnom Penh, the population of the city had swelled to several million, tripling its number of residents in a span of five years.This increase was the result of a flood of refugees from rural provinces to escape armed conflict, aerial bombardment and forced conscription by the Khmer Rouge.When they gained control of the country, the Khmer Rouge evacuated all cities and forced the residents to go to their native villages.Confused and filled with fear of the unknown, the population was evacuated in all directions under the constant surveillance of Khmer Rouge soldiers.The evacuation of the cities only hinted at the terror to come.Over the ensuing months and years, the Khmer Rouge forced city dwellers to perform hard labour in the countryside. 

The population was transferred to collective cooperatives and assigned to work on massive agricultural and irrigation projects.To maintain control of the population and of production, the Khmer Rouge created security centres and labour camps throughout the country.Hospitals, schools and temples were closed or transformed into warehouses or prisons; religious practices and money were banned; and all cultural references from the previous regime, including family life and certain languages, were disallowed.This attempt to reconstruct the country according to the ideology of the Khmer Rouge resulted in mass violence and fear, the consequences of which have lingered in Cambodia. 

A fundamental characteristic of the DK regime was the constant relocation of its population.

People were repeatedly moved from one place to another – from their place of birth to a different zone and from one cooperative to another.Relocations were ordered from the provinces of Kampong Cham, Takeo, Kandal and Prey Veng to Pursat, Battambang, Banteay Meanchey and so on. In general, the movement was from the southeast to the northwest part of the country.

The evacuees were terrified, confused and traumatised as they were starved, separated from their family members and forced to journey into the unknown.The train journeys in particular were very traumatic. Evacuees were provided with almost nothing to eat and were separated from their family members at each train stop. 

The painful losses and trauma of the Cambodian citizens speak directly to the violence committed.

The permanent exhibitions of the Documentation Center of Cambodia titled Forced Transfers, created in collaboration with the Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts, includes survivors’ stories of the evacuations and daily living conditions during DK, as well as recollections of former Khmer Rouge soldiers who participated in the mass relocations of the population.

Through striking photographs, survivors’ narratives, maps and folktales, these exhibitions provide a tranquil space for remembering, acknowledging and honouring the suffering of the victims of the Khmer Rouge regime. 

The educational programs incorporated within the exhibitions will begin at the provincial museums in Battambang and Banteay Meanchey and end in Kampong Thom, Svay Rieng and Takeo.

These programs will help promote meaningful intergenerational discussion about the history and legacy of the Khmer Rouge among Cambodians as well as among international visitors.

The education will take place in public and private spaces, including provincial museums, schools, homes and specific sites where the Khmer Rouge committed violent acts.

We hope that these exhibitions will provide visitors with a glimpse of the trauma and fear that was omnipresent in the practices of the regime. 

As a member of the generation who was born after those traumatic years, the images of the forced evacuations and the pathetic daily living conditions of my family exist only in my imagination.

They are never revealed in discussions between my father and me.The silent nature of my father explains everything and nothing at all.His silence forces me to realise how traumatic life was then.It also conceals details of life under the regime behind a shadow of darkness.I sincerely hope the photographs and narratives contained in the exhibitions will inspire people to share memories and learn more about the history of the DK regime.One person’s story represents only a piece of the larger puzzle, the totality of which will ultimately provide an historical record of Cambodia’s past. 

Piecing that puzzle together is the process through which we can better understand the violence inflicted upon my family and other Cambodian families as a whole.

The impact of that violence is felt by all of us on a daily basis and fuels a desire to restore humanity, dignity and honour to all survivors of the genocide perpetrated by the Democratic Kampuchea regime.

‘Hacktivists’ unmasked

Two members of Anonymous Cambodia, the local arm of the international “hacktivist” collective, were arrested earlier this month following an eight-month-long investigation in conjunction with the US Federal Bureau of Investigation, the National Police announced yesterday.

The two suspects – both 21-year-old students at Phnom Penh’s SETEC Institute, a private university – have been charged under three articles of the criminal code related to computer hacking, and could face between one month and two years in prison and a fine of up to 4 million riel ($1,000).

They were arrested on April 7, and are being held in pretrial detention at Prey Sar prison.


“The authorities of the internal security department have investigated with the [cooperation of the representative in Cambodia] of the United States’ FBI for eight months to target the suspects [before] requesting an arrest warrant from the court to arrest the two students,” said Major General Chhay Sinarith, director of the Ministry of Interior’s internal security department.

“These are the first members of the Anonymous hacker group who have been arrested by the [Cambodian] police, and we found no [evidence] of any [planned] terrorist attack.”

The investigation began after complaints were filed by various government departments, including the National Election Committee, the Anti-Corruption Unit, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Phnom Penh City Hall, following attacks by Anonymous Cambodia on their websites in the latter half of last year.


As mass opposition-led protests against the government began after disputed parliamentary elections in July and the authorities’ response to demonstrations became more heavy-handed, leading to fatalities, Anonymous Cambodia launched what it called “Operation Cambodia Freedom”.

According to a statement posted on the website of the General Commissariat of the National Police yesterday, more than 30 government institutions and private companies have been attacked since the election.


The two suspects were named by police as Bun King Mongkolpanha, known online as “Black Cyber” or “Machine”, and Chu Songheng, known online as “Zoro”.Ahead of the election last year, Black Cyber claimed responsibility in an interview with the Post for an attack that took the National Election Committee website offline for about 12 hours, which he said was in protest of alleged government efforts to register illegal Vietnamese voters.Two gigabytes of data related to the voter list was also stolen and the information was later released by the group.


In that interview, Black Cyber said that he joined Anonymous in 2010 and was a hacker for primarily political reasons, but also to “enjoy the technology”.“Myself, I don’t think I’m a criminal . . . I’m certain I’m not a criminal,” he said at the time, adding somewhat presciently that he feared foreign involvement in a government investigation.“The Cambodian government by itself won’t catch us,” he told the Post. “But they might if they collaborate with other agencies like from around the world, like the FBI, CIA or NSA.”US Embassy spokesman Sean McIntosh said that the embassy would not comment on “ongoing investigations”.

In response to whether FBI agents had been deployed from the US, he added that permanent FBI legal attaches at US embassies “work with the law enforcement and security agencies in a host country to coordinate investigations of interest to both countries”.Police said yesterday that they are continuing to investigate other suspected hackers working with Anonymous Cambodia and that the pair had already confessed to being part of the group.“The confession of the two suspects recognised their illegal activity [as members of Anonymous Cambodia] but they claimed they had just wanted to learn hacker skills,” Sinarith said.


The police statement, however, said that only Songheng, or Zoro, and not Mongkolpanha, or Black Cyber, had claimed he had not participated in any attacks.Anonymous Cambodia did not respond to requests for comment yesterday and the group hasn’t posted any statements about the attack.Since a draft law on cybercrime was leaked on April 9, however, the group’s twitter page has repeatedly posted that “#OpCambodia is a go. Cambodia’s government is trying to censor their internet.”
The draft law contained broad provisions for what could constitute a cybercrime, leading rights groups to fear that it could be used to silence government critics online.


The Anonymous Cambodia arrests mark the first time local hackers targeting the government have been taken into custody, said Ou Phannarith, director of the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications’ ICT security department.“This shows us that our authority [has] enough capacity to crack down on cybercrime in the Kingdom. This [does] not only refer to local hackers who hacked local websites but also other hackers who [have] committed cybercrime offence into Cambodian soil or using Cambodia as [a] base to attack others,” he said.

At the SETEC Institute, which offers degrees in information technology and information systems, news of the arrests were a hot topic yesterday, students said.“Members from Anonymous are not only from our school but also from other schools,” one IT student, who declined to be named, said, adding that he had never met the suspects.A university official who also declined to be named said that while Songheng had been taken away by a group of plainclothes police who arrived at the institute on April 7, he was not aware if Mongkolpanha was also arrested at the university.He also took the opportunity to distance the institute from the alleged illegal activities.“We don’t teach them to do things like this, we don’t allow the students to do bad things,” he said.

Soldiers practice for the 60th Dien Bien Phu Victory parade

The parade in Dien Bien Phu City is expected to attract the participation of about 15,000 veterans, workers, farmers, scholars and people of all ethnic groups of Dien Bien Province.Honored to participate in the parade, officers and soldiers of Military Zone 2 are practicing diligently for the event.
Some pictures of the rehearsal:



 
 
 


 
 

Obama Asia tour: China 'the elephant in the room'

 
So said retired General Xu Guangyu in answer to a question about China's growing military might.
General Xu is 80 and has been with the People's Liberation Army since the age of 16.
Foreign journalists are not allowed into military compounds so we met in a Beijing coffee shop to discuss President Obama's visit to Asia.Alarming standoff"Of course an elephant can't turn itself into a rabbit any more than a rabbit can turn itself into an elephant. But the elephant does not eat rabbits. The only danger is that it treads on them."

Gen Xu argues the US would not like it if Chinese forces were deployed on America's doorstep

That is a message for the Philippines with reference to their dispute over a scattering of islands in the South China Sea.

But more alarming is the standoff with Japan over islands in the East China Sea.
In Gen Xu's view, Japan should consider hard demographic realities."The Chinese population is 10 times that of Japan, so the Japanese should expect China to be 10 times stronger."Beijing is not on President Obama's itinerary this week.But as he discusses economics and security with allies in Japan, South Korea and the Philippines, China will be very much the elephant in the room and China itself will be watching closely.The Obama administration has promised what it calls a "pivot to Asia", which in security terms means changing the balance of its forces.

Instead of spreading them 50:50 between the Pacific and the Atlantic, the objective is 60:40 in favour of Asia."How would they like it if we took 60% of our forces and sailed up and down in front of their doorstep?" asked Gen Xu."We want to achieve parity because we don't want to be bullied. It will take us another 30 years."The irony in all of this is that since Chairman Mao met President Nixon in 1972, US military dominance in Asia has set the stage for China's rise, providing the security for China to grow rich and strong.

That was then and this is now. With double digit defence spending and a newly assertive tone from President Xi down, China is signalling that it wants a change of the rules and a different map.
In Gen Xu's words: "It's just as Napoleon said. When China wakes it will shake the world. And the Americans can't bear it. We've woken up and we're recovering our might."
Disappointment shared Another octogenarian meanwhile is in waders and baseball cap, up to his waist in sea water and pushing a 12m (39ft) scale model of an aircraft carrier into the East China Sea.

How navy-obsessed is China? The BBC's Carrie Gracie finds out

Wen Yuzhun expects his grandson to see a China that is militarily far stronger than it is today

"I built it for my grandson," retiree Wen Yuzhun explains as he hauls a matching model fighter plane onto the deck."Qingdao is the home of China's aircraft carrier but we can't get close enough to see it."
I share his disappointment. The People's Liberation Army does not yet do naval facility trips for foreign journalists. The closest I can get to the pride of the Chinese fleet is a chug around the bay on Mr Wen's model.At 80, he says he won't live long enough to see China become a great sea power, but he hopes his grandson will.

"One aircraft carrier is not enough. Ten aircraft carriers are not enough. Look what's happening now. Japan is bullying China. It sees China as not strong enough and there's nothing we can do about it."
Wen Yuzhun, like Gen Xu, will be listening closely to what President Obama has to say on his Asian tour, alert for warning signs that the US might encourage the territorial claims of China's neighbours.
Along with their government and many of their compatriots, these octogenarians dream of a day when China might be strong enough to enforce its own claims in these seas.

FBI seeks victims of 'prolific' international child predator

 

An alleged child predator who taught at schools across the world for more than four decades may have more victims, and the FBI is trying to track them down, the agency's Houston bureau said Tuesday.William James Vahey killed himself in Luverne, Minnesota, last month, two days after a federal judge in Houston said authorities could search one of Vahey's thumb drives that allegedly contained images depicting sexual assault on children, CNN affiliate KPRC reported.

There were images of at least 90 victims, dating back to 2008, and the FBI is encouraging additional alleged victims to come forward. The images on the thumb drive allegedly belonging to Vahey showed boys, estimated to be between 12 and 14 years old, asleep or unconscious, the agency said.

The images had captions and dates referencing places that Vahey had previously traveled with students, the FBI said."This is one of the most prolific alleged predators we've ever seen," Houston FBI Special Agent Shauna Dunlap told the station. 

Vahey began teaching in private schools in 1972, the FBI says. He last taught at the American Nicaraguan School in Pista Suburbana, Managua, Nicaragua from August 2013 until March 11, two days before he committed suicide, KPRC reported.The case came to law enforcement attention after Vahey fired his maid for allegedly stealing personal items from his home last year, KPRC said. In March, the ex-maid brought a stolen thumb drive to the American Nicaraguan School, saying she came forward because the drive contained sexual images, the station reported. 

The FBI said that when Vahey was confronted with the images, he "reportedly admitted molesting boys throughout his entire life and said he gave the minors sleeping pills prior to the molestation."

He had residences in London and Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, and traveled extensively, the FBI said. He worked at schools in nine countries, teaching a variety of subjects and coaching boys' basketball. He regularly accompanied students on overnight field trips, the FBI said.

The schools where he taught are, according to the FBI:

-- American Nicaraguan School in Managua, Nicaragua (2013-2014)

-- Southbank International School in London, United Kingdom (2009-2013)

-- Escuela Campo Alegre in Caracas, Venezuela (2002-2009)

-- Jakarta International School in Jakarta, Indonesia (1992-2002)

-- Saudi Aramco Schools in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia (1980-1992)

-- American Community School in Athens, Greece (1978-1980)

-- Passargad School in Ahwaz, Iran (1976-1978)

-- American School of Madrid in Spain (1975-1976)

-- American Community School of Beirut in Lebanon (1973-1975)

-- Tehran American School in Iran (1972-1973)

Anyone who has information on Vahey and who believes he victimized them can send a confidential e-mail to HOvictimassistance@ic.fbi.gov or contact their local FBI office or nearest U.S. Embassy.

West, Texas, fertilizer plant blast that killed 15 'preventable,' safety board says

 

The 2013 fertilizer plant blast that killed 15 people and wounded another 226 in West, Texas, "should never have occurred," the chairman of the U.S. Chemical Safety Board said Tuesday.

Though the board's report says that at least 14 people were killed, the death toll was updated to 15 people in the days after the blast.The board's investigation, released a few days after the first anniversary of the explosion, indicates that the incident was "preventable," Chairman Rafael Moure-Eraso said in a statement distributed to reporters that put blame on the company and government regulators."It resulted from the failure of a company to take the necessary steps to avert a preventable fire and explosion and from the inability of federal, state and local regulatory agencies to identify a serious hazard and correct it," Moure-Eraso said.McLennan County, for example, didn't have an emergency response plan in place, and "the community clearly was not aware of the potential hazard at West Fertilizer," the report said.

A lack of fire codes was repeatedly cited in the report, with investigators noting that Texas didn't have a fire code and small counties are prohibited from having them. But, the chairman said, local fire departments need fire codes to "hold industrial operators accountable for safe storage and handling of chemicals."The board's supervisory investigator, Johnnie Banks, said all levels of government also failed to adopt codes to keep populated areas away from hazardous facilities. This is not unique to West, Banks said."We found 1,351 facilities across the country that store ammonium nitrate," he said, adding that farm communities are just beginning to collect information on the proximity of homes and schools to ammonium nitrate storage facilities.

The investigation determined that "lessons learned" from responses to similar incidents were not disseminated to firefighters, 11 of whom died when the West plant exploded.

The probe said guidelines from the National Fire Protection Association and U.S. Department of Transportation recommend that firefighters evacuate the area surrounding "massive" ammonium nitrate fires and that the area be doused with water "from a distance." However, the report said, the guidance is vague because of the use of subjective words like "massive," "large" and "distance."

"All of these provisions should be reviewed and harmonized in light of the West disaster to ensure that firefighters are adequately protected and are not put into danger protecting property alone," Banks said.

U.S. guidelines for ammonium nitrate storage have been static for decades, the board said, but the United Kingdom in 1996 mandated that storage facilities be one story, well ventilated and constructed of concrete, brick or steel.Moure-Eraso lauded the Fertilizer Institute for recently establishing guidelines for storage and transportation of ammonium nitrate, along with recommendations for first responders in the event of a fire. He further called on all states and counties to likewise update their guidelines. 

"The state of Texas, McLennan County, (the Occupational Safety and Health Administration) and the (U.S. Environmental Protection Agency) have work to do because this hazard exists in hundreds of locations across the U.S.," Moure-Eraso wrote. "However, it is important to note that there is no substitute for an efficient regulatory system that ensures that all companies are operating to the same high standards. We cannot depend on voluntary compliance."Though the Chemical Safety Board investigates serious chemical accidents and makes safety recommendations, it does not issue fines or citations. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives and the state Fire Marshal's Office said last week that their investigation into the cause of the fire remains active.