Healing anxieties and fear, the hidden wounds inflicted by the Khmer Rouges
by Dario Salvi
Some 30 years after the fall of the blood-drenched regime, the country still bears the “social and personal” scars caused by violence and slaughter. Anxiety, stress and depression affect more than 10 per cent of the population, but are seen as “ghosts to be rid off through rituals”. A Catholic health care worker talks about her work and the need for more facilities to meet the emergency.
Rome (AsiaNews) – The Khmer Rouge trial is “a form of rehabilitation and healing” for all Cambodians who still bear the wounds inflicted by Maoist revolutionaries. In addition to the “social wounds” that people share, “personal traumas” caused by the massacres perpetuated by the Khmer Rouge regime persist, “sealed away inisde” out of fear or shame, or because facilities needed to deal with them are non-existent, said Many Phok.
The 30-year-old married mother of two is also the deputy director of an NGO, New Hope for Cambodian Children. She spoke to AsiaNews in Rome where she represents Cambodia at the 26th International Conference of the Pontifical Council for Health Care Workers that opened yesterday in the Vatican. This year’s meeting, titled ‘Health Pastoral Care, Serving Life in the Light of the Magisterium of Blessed John Paul II’,” is dedicated to Karol Wojtyla. An estimated 685 participants are expected from 70 countries.
On Monday, the UN court trying Khmer Rouge crimes in Phnom Penh opened a second trial against Khmer Rouge leaders Nuon Chea, aka ‘Brother Number two’, Democratic Kampuchea former President Khieu Samphan, and former Foreign Minister Ieng Sary.
The first trial ended in a 30-year sentence for Kaing Guek Eav, aka ‘Comrade Duch’, for his role as head of the infamous S-21 prison. Located at Tuol Sleng, a hill in Phnom Penh, the prison saw the death of 15,000 people; only seven former inmates survived.
Led by Pol Pot, the Maoist dictatorship lasted from 1975 to 1979. During that time, almost 2 million people or a quarter of the entire population died.
Although critical of the UN tribunal because of accusations of corruption and inefficiency, most Cambodians see it as “tool of healing” to deal with their collective and individual scars.
“People show their suffering upfront when they are in the witness box as they recall the time of massacres,” Many Phok said. At the same time, a “sense of relief” comes over them after they tell their stories to the judges. “We can’t forget the past,” she explained. “And until now, we have not had an opportunity to reflect upon what the country went through.”
Although it might still be too early to look at the Khmer Rouge era with an adequate distance, 30 years later, people are starting to look at this past. They want to preserve the memory of the regime’s victims but also to know “why the Cambodian people tried to destroy itself”.
“Each year,” Many Phok noted, “my family pays tribute to my grandfather, who was killed by the Khmer Rouges. The anniversary provides an opportunity to weep for the victims and remember the past. But when the trial is on TV, tears dry up and emotions are replaced by a desire to comprehend the past. Every day life and the places that remind you of the genocide make it impossible to forget what happened.”
The collective tragedy of a people is compounded by individual psychological traumas that continue or emerge over time. The latter must be treated with appropriate therapies, but in Cambodia this approach and those who seek help hit against a wall of suspicion and reticence. Cambodian folk wisdom focuses on self-reliance, Many Phok explained, and this indicative of “widespread suspicion towards mental illness, which people tend to hide even from relatives, as if they were sources of shame and humiliation.”
Depression, anxiety, panic attacks and other conditions related to mental and social malaise or personal traumas are seen as “ghosts that seize people”, to be cured through rituals, special blessings or magical formulas to “chase away evil spirits”. Rather than go to the doctor, people go to “faith-healers or the Buddhist monks for a ritual.”
In fact, psychological problems are “widespread”, Many Phok explained. Known as ‘illnesses on the road to the heart”, they affect “more than 10 per cent of the population, but the figure could be higher.”
Things are made worse by confusion between neurobiology and psychiatry as well as the lack of facilities. In some places, wards are “more like cages for the mad” and are an obstacle to treatment and healing.
A centre for patients suffering from psychological problems exists in Phnom Penh. The same is not the case outside the capital. There are shortages of all sorts and the needs of the population cannot be met.
For the Catholic activist, “counselling activities for patients, both adults and children, is fundamental to understand what therapy to follow in order to treat the underlying causes of social or personal malaise.”
The 30-year-old married mother of two is also the deputy director of an NGO, New Hope for Cambodian Children. She spoke to AsiaNews in Rome where she represents Cambodia at the 26th International Conference of the Pontifical Council for Health Care Workers that opened yesterday in the Vatican. This year’s meeting, titled ‘Health Pastoral Care, Serving Life in the Light of the Magisterium of Blessed John Paul II’,” is dedicated to Karol Wojtyla. An estimated 685 participants are expected from 70 countries.
On Monday, the UN court trying Khmer Rouge crimes in Phnom Penh opened a second trial against Khmer Rouge leaders Nuon Chea, aka ‘Brother Number two’, Democratic Kampuchea former President Khieu Samphan, and former Foreign Minister Ieng Sary.
The first trial ended in a 30-year sentence for Kaing Guek Eav, aka ‘Comrade Duch’, for his role as head of the infamous S-21 prison. Located at Tuol Sleng, a hill in Phnom Penh, the prison saw the death of 15,000 people; only seven former inmates survived.
Led by Pol Pot, the Maoist dictatorship lasted from 1975 to 1979. During that time, almost 2 million people or a quarter of the entire population died.
Although critical of the UN tribunal because of accusations of corruption and inefficiency, most Cambodians see it as “tool of healing” to deal with their collective and individual scars.
“People show their suffering upfront when they are in the witness box as they recall the time of massacres,” Many Phok said. At the same time, a “sense of relief” comes over them after they tell their stories to the judges. “We can’t forget the past,” she explained. “And until now, we have not had an opportunity to reflect upon what the country went through.”
Although it might still be too early to look at the Khmer Rouge era with an adequate distance, 30 years later, people are starting to look at this past. They want to preserve the memory of the regime’s victims but also to know “why the Cambodian people tried to destroy itself”.
“Each year,” Many Phok noted, “my family pays tribute to my grandfather, who was killed by the Khmer Rouges. The anniversary provides an opportunity to weep for the victims and remember the past. But when the trial is on TV, tears dry up and emotions are replaced by a desire to comprehend the past. Every day life and the places that remind you of the genocide make it impossible to forget what happened.”
The collective tragedy of a people is compounded by individual psychological traumas that continue or emerge over time. The latter must be treated with appropriate therapies, but in Cambodia this approach and those who seek help hit against a wall of suspicion and reticence. Cambodian folk wisdom focuses on self-reliance, Many Phok explained, and this indicative of “widespread suspicion towards mental illness, which people tend to hide even from relatives, as if they were sources of shame and humiliation.”
Depression, anxiety, panic attacks and other conditions related to mental and social malaise or personal traumas are seen as “ghosts that seize people”, to be cured through rituals, special blessings or magical formulas to “chase away evil spirits”. Rather than go to the doctor, people go to “faith-healers or the Buddhist monks for a ritual.”
In fact, psychological problems are “widespread”, Many Phok explained. Known as ‘illnesses on the road to the heart”, they affect “more than 10 per cent of the population, but the figure could be higher.”
Things are made worse by confusion between neurobiology and psychiatry as well as the lack of facilities. In some places, wards are “more like cages for the mad” and are an obstacle to treatment and healing.
A centre for patients suffering from psychological problems exists in Phnom Penh. The same is not the case outside the capital. There are shortages of all sorts and the needs of the population cannot be met.
For the Catholic activist, “counselling activities for patients, both adults and children, is fundamental to understand what therapy to follow in order to treat the underlying causes of social or personal malaise.”
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