Killing Fields

Many of you will be aware of the many atrocities committed during the late 1970s in Cambodia by Pol Pot and his Khmer Rouge.  During this period of genocide, it is estimated that somewhere between a fifth and a quarter of the population of Cambodia was killed to purge the society of intellectuals and anyone with education and skills in order to start a new agrarian communist society.  The locations where the executions took place have become known collectively as the "killing fields."  On our way home from the well projects, we stopped at a mountain on which a prison was located and where many "enemies" of the regime were killed by being lined up facing the edge of cliffs near the top of the mountain and struck violently in the back of the head with bamboo poles and propelled to their deaths on the rocks below.

The former prison has been converted into a Buddhist shrine.

Here is a shot from below a cliff where many were sent to their deaths.  There are many spots like this on the mountain.

There are also a lot of holes like this near the top of the mountain opening up to open rock spaces some distance below.  Apparently these were favorites spots for Pol Pot's soldiers to do their evil. 

There were also several places where skulls and other bones from the genocide victims were placed,

There were also a lot of monkeys around waiting for a handout from visitors.

This one received a banana.

 I'm not sure what this monkey was looking at but I'm glad no one had a bamboo pole handy.