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Khmer Rouge was the communist party that ruled Cambodia after overthrowing the Cambodian government. It is a brutal, disastrous rule that changed the country forever and shocked the world.

The Khmer Rouge had thousands of followers and an insurgency had begun against the government in the year’70. With the aid of the Viet Cong troops and the North Vietnamese, the Khmer Rouge gained control over a large part of Cambodia. It grew very popular in a short time and increased from 3,000 to 30,000 in strength in just three years, from’70 to’73, sending back the Viet Cong troops and Vietnamese whose help was no longer needed.

Finally, led by Pol Pot, the Khmer Rouge overthrew the Cambodian government in’75, after which the “Democratic Kampuchea” was established. Literally overnight, the new governance took cruel and drastic measures. Entire cities were evacuated. Property was abolished. Factories were closed. Schools were shut down. Money did not hold any value. Hundreds of thousands of taxi drivers, cooks, factory workers, clerks and everyone else became farmers suddenly. They even assassinated skilled workers and intellectuals, and many others died due to starvation. Records show that at least 2 million people died. Cambodia was reduced to nothing but a nation of slaves.

By the year’79, tensions with Vietnam increased and Vietnamese troops invaded, helping the rival Communists factions in deposing the new Khmer Rouge government. But the Khmer Rouge continued to have a huge army of 30,000 near the Thai border and was also recognized by the United Nations as the official Cambodian government.

This government formed a coalition in’82, with Norodom Sihanouk, the former premier and the non-Communist leader, Son Sann. Pol Pot gave up his leadership for Khieu Samphan, but it was said to Pol Pot who continued to call the shots. On the request of the different factions in Cambodia, who signed a treaty, the United Nations assumed administration of the government in’91 and help elections in’92. Around that time, the Khmer Rouge withdrew itself from the peace process did not accept the results of the elections which led to the formation of a coalition government in Cambodia, and began fighting again.

Internal disputes led the Khmer Rouge to disintegrate in’97, leading to the imprisonment of Pol Pot. He died soon after in’98, bringing to a close what was the worst reign of modern times. By’99, all the other members of the Khmer Rouge were defected, captured or surrendered.

Initially, reports of the mass murders in Cambodia were not taken seriously by most people, until the Vietnamese overpowered the Khmer Rouge. It was then the horrors of Cambodia came to fore.

Khmer Rouge is considered to be the deadliest and most shocking reigns of the modern era. The death toll is not an indication of the brutalities that Cambodians had to suffer in the hands of unscrupulous elements that formed the government. It created such an impact on the world that there never was another revolution that was worse than the one in Cambodia.

Learn more about khmer culture and the people of Cambodia at KhmerArticles.com

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