PHNOM PENH and BATTAMBANG - The Khmer Rouge's former chief executioner asked
for Christian forgiveness this week on the witness stand. Kaing Guek Eav, alias
Duch, is charged with overseeing the radical regime's S-21 torture prison,
where more than 12,000 Cambodians lost their lives. Like many of his former
cadres, he found religion late in life.
His testimony conceding guilt, which could affect the fate of the regime's
other four top cadres, has been influenced by his conversion to Christianity in
the mid-1990s, analysts say. The other detainees at the tribunal have denied
responsibility for the deaths of an estimated 1.7 million Cambodians from
disease, starvation and executions during the Khmer Rouge's four-year reign of
terror.
"At the beginning I only prayed to ask forgiveness from my
parents. But later on, I attempted to pray for forgiveness from the whole
nation, for all the people who died," Duch said Tuesday on the second day of
his trial at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia in Phnom
Penh. "I would like to express my regret and my heartfelt sorrow and loss for
all of the crimes committed by the CPK [Communist Party of Kampuchea] from 1975
to 1979."
"I would like to emphasize that I am responsible for the crimes committed at
S-21, especially the torture and execution of the people there," the
66-year-old Duch told a packed courtroom on Tuesday in an address broadcast
live on national radio and television. "I would like you to please leave an
open window for me to be forgiven."
Those words have set the stage for painful revelations in the weeks ahead.
While the Christian Duch apparently aims for salvation through contrition, his
former Khmer Rouge colleagues - some who have turned to Buddhism - maintain
their innocence. Some view this as a bid to avoid karmic retribution for their
sins in the next life.
Once outlawed by the atheist Khmer Rouge, religion has made a comeback among
the radical revolutionaries who brutally transformed Cambodia into a nation of
killing fields. Buddhist shrines were destroyed and Christian adherents
persecuted as a matter of policy during the Khmer Rouge's paranoid reign.
According to local religious figures, meditative ex-Khmer Rouge cadres now fill
Buddhist temples or alternately praise Jesus in Christian churches. Khmer Rouge
Brother Number 2 Nuon Chea, the regime's chief ideologue who was arrested in
2007 on crimes against humanity and war crimes, has publicly acknowledged his
conversion later in life to Buddhism.
"I personally respect all religions, but mainly Buddhism, as it belongs to the
nation," Nuon Chea told The Cambodia Daily newspaper in 2003. During that
interview he presented himself as a devout Buddhist, with a large poster of a
revered Thai monk tacked to his wall and claims that Buddhist monks visited him
regularly to consult on Buddhist teachings.
According to sources familiar with the detainees, Duch has continued to take
communion while in detention and Nuon Chea has decorated his cell with a poster
of a venerable Buddhist monk. Religious experts say that while religion alone
can not explain the opposing pleas lodged by former Khmer Rouge cadres, the two
different faiths inspire their adherents to face the past in starkly different
ways.
"Christianity in particular has put more emphasis on the sin/redemption theme
than most religions," said Stanford University religion professor Carl
Bielefeldt. "Conversion to Buddhism may mean little more than relaxing into the
default culture, rather than committing oneself to a spiritual choice … In
contrast, conversion to a culturally alien religion [to Cambodia] like
Christianity may involve a much more self-conscious spiritual choice."
Faithful minority
Currently round 95% of Cambodia's citizens adhere to Buddhism. When the Khmer
Rouge were overthrown in 1979, less than 200 Christians remained from a
pre-1975 congregation of 20,000, according to Heng Cheng, the head of the
Evangelical Fellowship of Cambodia. Today, more than 100,000 Cambodians belong
to more than 3,000 evangelical churches across the country, among them many
former members of the Khmer Rouge.
"The former Khmer Rouge more often open their hearts [to God]," said Heng
Cheng. "[Duch] is a role model."
Duch's conversion to Christianity has caused some friction with his former
cadres. For instance, Nuon Chea scoffed at Duch's conversion, saying in his
revealing 2003 interview: "[Duch] wanted God to take responsibility for his
sins! ... You commit the sin, so you pay for the sin. Nobody can help take
responsibility for the sin."
For his part, Nuon Chea does not accept responsibility for the Khmer Rouge's
atrocities, despite his high-ranking position at the time. Former Khmer Rouge
southwestern region army chief Meas Muth, who has not been charged by the
tribunal and is also a practicing Buddhist, similarly expresses no remorse for
his role in the revolution.
"I don't think the court will call me. But if they do, it's useless," he said,
adding that he is not guilty of crimes against humanity. Meas, the son-in-law
of deceased Khmer Rouge army commander Ta Mok, admits he conversed with the
regime's central committee members, including Nuon Chea and head of state Khieu
Samphan, but denies having had any influence over policy formulation.
Meas Muth, too, has found religion later in life. During a recent interview at
his spacious home on stilts on the outskirts of Battambang province's Samlot
town, he mentions the tens of thousands of dollars worth of donations he has
made to the local pagoda, Ta Sanh Chas. There, he gives Pali language lessons
and oversees building projects.
Thoeun Samnang, the chief Buddhist monk of Ta Sanh Chas temple, said Meas Muth
"comes to the pagoda every day. He comes to find peace with the Buddha." The
resident ascetic says he still remembers the day Meas Muth first arrived: the
auspicious date of 9-9-99.
"He is a blessing," said the saffron-robed monk, seated cross-legged in his
pagoda. "Former Khmer Rouge soldiers seem more interested in Buddhism. They
come here more than other people. They are more active in the pagoda."
It is religiously significant, some believe, that former top Khmer Rouge
leaders Meas Muth and Nuon Chea have not sought forgiveness for their roles in
the alleged genocide. One possible reason, suggests Columbia University's
Buddhist scholar Bob Thurman, is that Christianity uniquely claims that the
road to salvation runs through repentance, remorse and making up for past sins.
"Perhaps the Christian ones are more intent on [forgiveness] because they have
the belief that repentance and true belief in Christ will help them once and
for all reach heaven, no matter what they've done," Thurman wrote by e-mail.
"Whereas Buddhists do repent, do try to do better, but remain aware of a long
road ahead to reach enlightenment or nirvana - no one else can grant them the
ultimate salvation, in their view."
The monk Thoeun says that no matter how often Meas Muth visits his pagoda, the
former Khmer Rouge leader will invariably suffer in the next life for his
alleged actions in his current incarnation. "Meas Muth cannot escape from what
he did in the past. No matter what he does, he must pay for what he has done,"
the monk said.
When questioned about the notion that a Christian may escape karmic punishment
for wrongdoings, the ascetic balked: "Everyone must pay for what they've done.
Duch cannot be forgiven. Bad deeds are like shadows that follow you."
Remorse and repentance
Duch's 32-year-old daughter, Ky Sievkim, said that her father longs for
forgiveness and views Christianity as a path out of the dark shadow of the S-21
torture prison he previously ran. "My father told me that he had done many
wrong things, and that's why he asked Jesus for forgiveness," she said in a
recent interview at her small home, also on the outskirts of Samlot town.
Duch may have also converted to Christianity for protection, according to the
court's closing order indicting him for crimes against humanity. "Christianity,
the West and the realm of international justice symbolized a new form of
protection (also undeniably the most effective), because he suffered from
insecurity," the order states.
The temptation of salvation has drawn many other former Khmer Rouge cadres to
Christianity, according to Victory Heng, executive director of Cambodian
Christian Church Organization (CCCO) in Battambang town. "You can be the worst
sinner in the world and still enter the gates of heaven," Heng said.
The orginization supports about 100 churches in the provinces of Takeo and Siem
Reap, as well as in the former Khmer Rouge strongholds of Battambang, Oddar
Meanchey and Banteay Meanchey provinces. Many former Khmer Rouge cadres have
entered CCCO's churches, says Heng, although he doesn't maintain an exact
tally. "None of them come in and say, 'We are former Khmer Rouge.' And we don't
ask. It's not important to us. Our purpose is not to dig up the past. Our
purpose is to share Christ."
In that spiritual direction, every year CCCO holds a three-week training course
in Battambang town to convert laymen into practicing evangelists. "One of those
years, Duch walked through the doors of this building," Heng said, standing
outside the clapboard building of the Battambang Christian Church. The year was
1996 and at the end of the training course Duch was baptized nearby in the
Sangke River.
Suon Sito says he remembers that day well. He first met Duch four years earlier
in Banteay Meanchey province's Phkoam village, where Duch moved his family
after living in Thai refugee camps and in China throughout the 1980s. Within
months of Duch's arrival, Suon Sito invited him to a CCCO-sponsored house
church and soon Duch was inviting others to attend services.
As Duch drew closer to Christianity, he was also attempting to flee from his
past, Suon Sito said. He moved his family repeatedly throughout the 1990s -
first to another school in Banteay Meanchey, then to a school in Samlot town,
then back to a Thai refugee camp - but he never stopped telling his neighbors
about the power of Jesus Christ in his life.
"He asked me to be a Christian. He said he wanted to start a Christian
community," said Sok Lian, a resident of Samlot town who rented a home on
Duch's property for several months in 1999 until Duch's identity and
whereabouts were uncovered and published in international media.
When news broke in 1999 of Duch's conversion to Christianity, renowned Cambodia
historian David Chandler, who had poured through reams of evidence at Duch's
torture prison, says he took Duch's professed conversion seriously.
"He must have given his conversion to Christianity serious thought, as he had
done with his conversion to communism in the 1960s, and saw both conversions as
ways of clarifying his mind, helping his spirit, and organizing his life,"
Chandler wrote by e-mail from Australia's Monash University.
"Maybe Duch was looking for refuge found only in Christianity," said Chea
Vannath, a political scientist in Cambodia who lives not far from S-21, which
is now maintained as a grisly tourist attraction. "Whatever mistakes you make,
you recognize and confess and Jesus Christ will help you ... It's possible that
if [Nuon Chea] was a Christian, he might confess too."
Stephen Kurczy is an Asia Times Online contributor based in Cambodia. He
may be reached at kurczy@gmail.com.
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