Um Sath (left), 89, of Long Beach, Calif., a Khmer Rouge survivor who lost her husband, three sons, and other relatives, at a Cambodian New Year celebration this month. She is one of many submitting testimony for a tribunal in Cambodia. (Barbara Davidson/ Los Angeles Times)
LONG BEACH, Calif. - At night, the old woman hears the voices of her children crying out for her. She knows they will never stop.
Um Sath is 89, and three decades have passed since the Khmer Rouge laid waste to Cambodia. But she shuts her eyes and taps her temples to show where the genocidal regime still rules with impunity.
"We miss you, Mama," the voices cry.
Sath spends much of her day sitting in silence. For years, she rarely left her house in Long Beach. Although she now finds peace chatting with the other haunted figures at a senior center, she has kept the echoes of the "killing fields" sealed tightly inside her head.
In March, she let them out - joining dozens of survivors at a recreation center in Long Beach to face their memories. They longed to see a reckoning for perpetrators of one of the worst atrocities of the 20th century.
Since February, a UN-backed tribunal in the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh has put on trial the first of five Khmer Rouge leaders charged with crimes against humanity, for the brutal experiment in communism that took at least 1.7 million lives between 1975 and 1979.
Activists in the United States want refugees outside Cambodia to submit testimony in an effort to spur a judicial process beset by delays, limited funds, and allegations of corruption. They hope, along the way, to relieve the emotional torture of survivors.
"I'm hoping it will allow them to tell the world what happened," said Leakhena Nou, an assistant professor of sociology at California State University, Long Beach who is leading the outreach effort in southern California, home of the world's largest Cambodian refugee community.
In the recreation center at a park, Nou explains to Sath and other victims the importance of submitting written testimony.
Nou understands this tribunal has problems. She knows it won't touch even a fraction of the era's killers. She knows political forces in Cambodia want to limit the tribunal's reach. She knows survivors' memories are fragmented and muddled. Asking them to condense incomprehensible horrors of that time into a few lines on a government form borders on cruel farce. And Nou hasn't even been assured that prosecutors will read the forms. But she still hopes this could be a starting point for Cambodians around the world to rally for justice.
She asks the survivors if they want to tell their stories to the group first. Sath stands up.
Sath and her husband were farmers and merchants along the Mekong River, south of Phnom Penh. In the middle class, with enough money to own a modest brick house, they were targets when the Khmer Rouge swept into power in 1975, brutally turning the country into a collective society of farm peasants. Intellectuals, teachers, doctors, bureaucrats, and soldiers were executed.
Khmer Rouge soldiers showed up at Sath's home with rifles, took her husband and told her to walk with her eight children. They had nothing but their clothes. Sath held her 6-year-old boy's hand. For days they wandered, following orders. Anyone who complained was dismissed by a bullet to the head.
One day, soldiers locked Sath in chains and took her husband. Days later, she overheard soldiers mention his execution.
Other stories poured out. One woman gets paper towels to hand around to wipe the tears.
When they get to the government forms, 21 people fill them out. No one remembers dates. Only one victim names a perpetrator. The rest do not remember their tormentors' names, never knew them, or are still scared.
Um Sath is 89, and three decades have passed since the Khmer Rouge laid waste to Cambodia. But she shuts her eyes and taps her temples to show where the genocidal regime still rules with impunity.
"We miss you, Mama," the voices cry.
Sath spends much of her day sitting in silence. For years, she rarely left her house in Long Beach. Although she now finds peace chatting with the other haunted figures at a senior center, she has kept the echoes of the "killing fields" sealed tightly inside her head.
In March, she let them out - joining dozens of survivors at a recreation center in Long Beach to face their memories. They longed to see a reckoning for perpetrators of one of the worst atrocities of the 20th century.
Since February, a UN-backed tribunal in the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh has put on trial the first of five Khmer Rouge leaders charged with crimes against humanity, for the brutal experiment in communism that took at least 1.7 million lives between 1975 and 1979.
Activists in the United States want refugees outside Cambodia to submit testimony in an effort to spur a judicial process beset by delays, limited funds, and allegations of corruption. They hope, along the way, to relieve the emotional torture of survivors.
"I'm hoping it will allow them to tell the world what happened," said Leakhena Nou, an assistant professor of sociology at California State University, Long Beach who is leading the outreach effort in southern California, home of the world's largest Cambodian refugee community.
In the recreation center at a park, Nou explains to Sath and other victims the importance of submitting written testimony.
Nou understands this tribunal has problems. She knows it won't touch even a fraction of the era's killers. She knows political forces in Cambodia want to limit the tribunal's reach. She knows survivors' memories are fragmented and muddled. Asking them to condense incomprehensible horrors of that time into a few lines on a government form borders on cruel farce. And Nou hasn't even been assured that prosecutors will read the forms. But she still hopes this could be a starting point for Cambodians around the world to rally for justice.
She asks the survivors if they want to tell their stories to the group first. Sath stands up.
Sath and her husband were farmers and merchants along the Mekong River, south of Phnom Penh. In the middle class, with enough money to own a modest brick house, they were targets when the Khmer Rouge swept into power in 1975, brutally turning the country into a collective society of farm peasants. Intellectuals, teachers, doctors, bureaucrats, and soldiers were executed.
Khmer Rouge soldiers showed up at Sath's home with rifles, took her husband and told her to walk with her eight children. They had nothing but their clothes. Sath held her 6-year-old boy's hand. For days they wandered, following orders. Anyone who complained was dismissed by a bullet to the head.
One day, soldiers locked Sath in chains and took her husband. Days later, she overheard soldiers mention his execution.
Other stories poured out. One woman gets paper towels to hand around to wipe the tears.
When they get to the government forms, 21 people fill them out. No one remembers dates. Only one victim names a perpetrator. The rest do not remember their tormentors' names, never knew them, or are still scared.
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