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Kaing Guek Eav was an ordinary young man growing up in Cambodia in the mid-twentieth century. He showed promise as a student, excelled in school, got a job as a math teacher, and experienced the political awakening common to young adulthood. But then he became a revolutionary, adopting the alias “Duch,” and took charge of S-21, the infamous secret security center of the Khmer Rouge where in less than four years at least 14,000 “enemies” of the revolution were incarcerated, interrogated, tortured, and executed. After the sudden collapse of the government, Duch fled to the Cambodian frontier, where he took yet another name and lived in workaday anonymity until he was finally unmasked a...
This fascinating book recounts the remarkable tale of a career UN official caught in the turmoil of international and domestic politics swirling around Cambodia after the fall of the Khmer Rouge. First as a member of the UN transitional authority and then as a personal envoy to the UN secretary-general, Benny Widyono re-creates the fierce battles for power centering on King Norodom Sihanouk, the Khmer Rouge, and Prime Minister Hun Sen. He also sets the international context, arguing that great-power geopolitics throughout the Cold War and post-Cold War eras triggered and sustained a tragedy of enormous proportions in Cambodia for decades, leading to a flawed peace process and the decline of Sihanouk as a dominant political figure. Putting a human face on international operations, this book will be invaluable reading for anyone interested in Southeast Asia, the role of international peacekeeping, and the international response to genocide.
& Quot;Founded in 1974, Southeast Asian Affairs provides, without fear or favour, informed and in-depth annual analyses of this vibrant region and its component countries. It is the only publication which does this and is in its own class without peers. It is a mandatory reference and read for those seriously interested in knowing Southeast Asia."--Professor A.B. Shamsul, Founding Director, Institute of Ethnic Studies, Universiti Bebangsaan Malaysia. "Now in its 38th edition, Southeast Asian Affairs offers an indispensable guide to this fascinating region. Lively, analytical, authori.
Reporting from war zones around the globe, acclaimed journalist William Shawcross gives us an unforgettable portrait of a dangerous world and of the brave men and women, ordinary and extraordinary, who risk their lives to make and keep the peace. The end of the Cold War was followed by a decade of regional and ethnic wars, massacres and forced exiles, and by constant calls for America to lead the international community as chief peace-keeper. The efforts of that community -- identified with the United Nations but often dominated by the world's wealthy nations -- have had mixed results. In Africa, the West is accused of indifference or too little, too late. In Cambodia, the UN presides over f...
The Chinese Perspectives on Human Rights and Good Governance series reviews various aspects of human rights and good governance in China, including international human rights standards, specific substantive rights protection and rule of law, as well as constitutionalism, especially in the context of contemporary China. Its aim is to stimulate discussion on these and related topics, with a focus on international standards whenever these are applicable and relevant to China. In this first volume in the series, the contributors adopt different disciplinary approaches to look at China both in the context of its internal constraints and as a global player in the overall development of human rights. Where is China headed in the near future? Does Chinese culture stand in contradiction to human rights? Is the rule of law alien to Chinese society? Can China move ahead without political reforms? In this thought-provoking volume, leading Chinese and Western scholars offer analysis of these issues, also with reference to Chinese history and contemporary culture.
This book illustrates the limits to the 1990s UNTAC peacekeeping intervention in Cambodia and raises a critical challenge to the assumptions underpinning key tenets of the 'Liberal Project' as a mechanism for resolving complex, severe struggles for elite political power in developing countries. The book highlights the limitations of externally imposed power-sharing. In the case of Cambodia, the imagined effect was a coalition that would share power democratically. However, this approach was appropriate only for resolving the superpower conflict that had created Cambodia's war. Rather than bringing long-term peace to Cambodia, Roberts argues, it created the temporary illusion of a democratic system that in fact recreated the military conflict and housed it in a superficial coalition. The book challenges assumptions regarding the inevitability of the globalization of liberalism as a means of ordering non-western societies. It explains the failure of democratic transition in terms of the impropriety and weakness of the plan which preceded it, and in terms of the elite's traditional reliance on absolutism and resistance to the concept of 'Opposition'.
This volume deals with aspects of genocide in Rwanda and Cambodia that have been largely unexplored to date, including the impact of regional politics and the role played by social institutions in perpetrating genocide. Although the "story" of the Cambodian genocide of 1975-1979 and that of the Rwandan genocide of 1994 have been written about in detail, most have focused on how the genocides took place, what the ideas and motives were that led extremist factions to attempt to kill whole sections of their country's population, and who their victims were. This volume builds on our understanding of genocide in Cambodia and Rwanda by bringing new issues, sources, and approaches into focus. The c...
This book is the story of Peter Maguire's effort to learn how Cambodia's "culture of impunity" developed, why it persists, and the failures of the "international community" to confront the Cambodian genocide. Written from a personal and historical perspective, Facing Death in Cambodia recounts Maguire's growing anguish over the gap between theories of universal justice and political realities. Maguire documents the atrocities and the aftermath through personal interviews with victims and perpetrators, discussions with international officials, journalistic accounts, and government sources.
Drawing from 25 years of research and travel in Cambodia, the French anthropologist Marie Alexandrine Martin provides a new perspective on the Khmer Rouge's rise to power and the Vietnamese occupation of the country.