Killing Fields

The Killing Fields (Khmer: វាលពិឃាត, romanized: veal pikheat, [ʋiəl pikʰiət]) are a network of sites in Cambodia where large numbers of people were executed and buried by the Khmer Rouge regime during the period of Democratic Kampuchea from 1975 to 1979. The killings formed part of the Cambodian genocide, in which an estimated 1.7 to 2.2 million people died through execution, forced labour, starvation, and disease under the rule of the Communist Party of Kampuchea led by Pol Pot.

The term "killing fields" was popularised by Cambodian journalist Dith Pran, who survived the Khmer Rouge regime and later used the phrase to describe the mass execution sites scattered throughout the country. The phrase subsequently became internationally known through the 1984 film The Killing Fields.

More than 20,000 mass grave sites have been identified across Cambodia. Many victims were former officials of the Khmer Republic, members of the armed forces, intellectuals, professionals, teachers, religious figures, and civilians accused of political disloyalty or association with foreign governments. Ethnic and religious minorities, including ethnic Vietnamese, Chinese Cambodians, Chams, Thais, Christians, and Buddhist monks, were also systematically targeted.

Sociologist Martin Shaw described the Cambodian genocide as "the purest genocide of the Cold War era". The genocide ended in January 1979 when Vietnam invaded Cambodia during the Cambodian–Vietnamese War and overthrew the Khmer Rouge government.

Background

Following the Khmer Rouge victory in the Cambodian Civil War on 17 April 1975, the new government evacuated major cities, abolished private property and currency, outlawed religion, and attempted to transform Cambodia into an agrarian socialist society.