Mel Lai

VPA-KT0051

Mel Lai

Male

Khmer

Khmer

Kbil, Sankor, Kampong Svay,Kampong Thom

19620301

Farmer

Kbil village, Sankor commune, Kampong Svay district, Kampong Thom province, Cambodia

1975

Kbil, Sankor, Kampong Svay, Kampong Thom province

Evacuation:

When the Khmer Rouge came to power on April 17, 1975, residents of Kampong Thom, including me, were evacuated to our home villages. People who were evacuated to Kampong Thom provincial town were sent to live in Prey Thmanhoung , one and a half kilometers north of the national road. During the year I lived there, I heard Prich, the chief of Thbil Village, state that people who had been evacuated to Kampong Thom provincial town were later sent to live in the forest because they were regarded as new people. The base people who had lived in the village and had not been deported outside the village had more rights than the new people. After the villagers lived in the area for one year, they allowed them to go back to their home village.

Forced labor:

In 1976, when I arrived in the village along with the other evacuees, Comrade Prich assigned me to transplant dry rice at Tasom Island for two months and twenty days. Because I was suffering from malaria, an unknown unit chief sent me back to the village. Upon my return home, I drank Khmer traditional medicine. After I recovered, Prich, the village chief, assigned me to dig up termite mounds with other elderly people in the village.

Next, Prich sent me to Kdeisen District. Chin, the chief of the mobile unit, put me to work transplanting rice seedlings. A short while later, Comrade Chin transferred me to work on building the 6 January Dam day and night. I had to carry two square meters of earth and then two more square meters of earth day and night. It was probably a short while later that I returned to work in Sen Sday Village. I was assigned to guard the mobile unit’s warehouse with other people who worked in the mobile unit. I had difficulties there because I was unable to tolerate witnessing the many executions, so I escaped and returned home.

Upon my return home, the village chief of the mobile unit based at Kop Thlok put me to work transplanting dry rice, digging up termite mounds, and climbing sugar palm trees at night. Comrade Yat, the mobile unit chief, assigned me to dig a 4-square-meter pit. Ten days later, the Vietnamese arrived, and I escaped from the village.

Starvation:

From 1975 to the liberation in 1979, I never had enough food to eat, despite the fact that I worked extremely hard. Every meal consisted only of a ladle of watery gruel, and there were just two meals per day. However, I received a bowl of rice to eat during the dry season. I do not know why insufficient food was provided. I do not remember a dining hall cook.

Execution:

In 1977, after I returned from working on the building of the 6 January Dam, I was assigned to the Tuol Sen mobile unit. While I was working as a guard, I saw Khmer Rouge security forces tie up five people, cover their mouths with cloth, and beat them, forcing them down into a well. I heard people screaming, but I dared not say anything. I heard people screaming every day, and one day in particular, I saw Khmer Rouge soldiers arrest villagers, put them into sacks, and take them away by truck. When the incident took place, I was cutting Antriengkhet, [a kind of tree] to make fertilizer. I did not recognize who they were, except an elderly man named Hoeun, the district chief, and also an elderly man named Chan.. I do not remember the district chefs’ name because many changes had been made. Scared, I escaped from the village.

Complainant

No;

Mental hospital

No;

20080325

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