Kong Sothanarith, VOA Khmer | Phnom Penh Wednesday, 12 May 2010
Photo: AP
Head of the Documention Centre Chhang Youk examines the genocide documents
at his office in Phnom Penh.
The Documentation Center of Cambodia says it has performed around $300,000
in unrecognized work for the UN-backed Khmer Rouge tribunal for services
related to copying and distributing thousands of documents for the court.
The Documentation Center has spent more than a decade investigating the
atrocities of the Khmer Rouge and has provided a wealth of documents to
the court, often at its own cost.
According to court documents obtained Wednesday, Chhang Youk, director of
the center, has written to tribunal administrators to say assistance from
the center "now amounts to more than" $300,000 for the past four years.
Chhang Youk requested in a letter that the Documentation Center be
credited as the source of the original copies and said the court could
duplicate documentary material "with the exception of photographs and
films for both official and related public use."
The center has provided 500,000 pages of documents to the court since
2006, including to offices of prosecutors, investigating judges, the
defense support section, defense teams and civil party lawyers, according
to the letter. It has also provided around 650 books, nearly 2,000 CDs and
DVDs of films and photographs and 254 microfilm reels.
Chhang Youk told VOA Khmer Wednesday it was important the court
"recognize" the state of affairs, as it is a model for similar courts in
the future.
Tribunal spokesman Reach Sambath said Wednesday the court was considering
the letter.
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About Me
- Duong Dara
- Dara Duong was born in 1971 in Battambang province, Cambodia. His life changed forever at age four, when the Khmer Rouge took over the country in 1975. During the regime that controlled Cambodia from 1975-1979, Dara’s father, grandparents, uncle and aunt were executed, along with almost 3 million other Cambodians. Dara’s mother managed to keep him and his brothers and sisters together and survive the years of the Khmer Rouge regime. However, when the Vietnamese liberated Cambodia, she did not want to live under Communist rule. She fled with her family to a refugee camp on the Cambodian-Thai border, where they lived for more than ten years. Since arriving in the United States, Dara’s goal has been to educate people about the rich Cambodian culture that the Khmer Rouge tried to destroy and about the genocide, so that the world will not stand by and allow such atrocities to occur again. Toward that end, he has created the Cambodian Cultural Museum and Killing Fields Memorial, which began in his garage and is now in White Center, Washington. Dara’s story is one of survival against enormous odds, one of perseverance, one of courage and hope.
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