Saturday, 21 June 2008

Cambodia and the Holocaust: Searching for Justice

The University of Minnesota
Saturday, June 21, 2008

In 1975 the Cambodian government began the systematic and brutal extermination of more than two million Cambodians, resulting in the deaths of nearly a third of the nation's population. The aftermath of this genocide is the subject of the Guthrie Theater's play "After a Hundred Years".

Cambodia and the Holocaust: Searching for JusticeSaturday, June 21 Workshop at the Guthrie Theater, 8:30-4:30Free and open to the public (includes matin?e performance of the play)CEU credit is available for teachers.To register, go to http://chgs.umn.edu/news/cambodia.html

This event is co-sponsored by the Guthrie Theatre Performance, "After a Hundred Years"A short synopsis of the play:

Journalist Luke Newhall travels to Phnom Penh, Cambodia, for a rare, career-making interview with Phan Mok, a Khmer Rouge general accused of heinous war crimes. On the eve of his United Nations tribunal, the general sits determined to defend his actions and rehabilitate his legacy of the era, as Narin Rath, a survivor of the Killing Fields, tells the gruesome tale of her survival, illustrating the history of guilt while suggesting a possibility for healing.

In grappling with the lies and truths of his interview subject, Newhall finds himself enmeshed in the life of photographer Sarah Whiting and her husband Tim Hedstrom, a prominent American doctor. Though Hedstrom appears devoted to the treatment of HIV/AIDS in this Third World country, a shocking truth reveals that it has been at the cost of betraying the ethical vows of his profession. As the characters' quests for truth intersect, they are drawn deeper into Cambodia's history and their own complicity in crimes past and present.

No comments: