Cambodia - Former M-13 prison/ Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum (former S-21)/ Choeung Ek Genocidal Centre (former Execution Site of S-21)

The Khmer Rouge regime governed Cambodia during Democratic Kampuchea (1975-1979) following a radical ideology - rooted from different communist beliefs and politics - that was put into practice in the entire country over an extremely short period of three years, eight months and twenty days. It is the only regime known to have emptied all cities in their sphere of power within days, forcing their inhabitants to move from their home places and to regroup in agricultural communes - as well as to undertake several subsequent massive population movements, involving also the rural. In a mixture of extreme nationalism and racism they wanted to realize an agrarian-autarkic society by destroying institutions of the former state, including schools, pagodas, industries and factories, killing intellectuals, professionals and monks, forbidding religion and traditions and replacing deep rooted family relations with the anonymous “Angkar” (the Organization). This so-called “Super great leap forward” was one of the most extreme examples of sociological experiment a regime or government ever tried to put in practice. It caused the death of millions inhabitants (around 25-30% of the entire population). The Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum and Choeung Ek Genocidal Center are the only historical sites that have so far been established as museum institutions in Cambodia to represent the crimes of the Khmer Rouge regime, although several smaller local memorials have been established, including the former prison M-13.