Ancestor Worship
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Khmer Rouge Dictator Pol Pot Still Revered Among Some in Cambodia
It has been more than three decades since the Khmer Rouge began a violent campaign that laid waste to Cambodia, killing up to a quarter of the population in pursuit of a communist utopia. As the four most senior surviving Khmer Rouge leaders go on trial in Phnom Penh, the man most responsible, Pol Pot will never see justice. He died in 1998 just as the extremist communist group was disintegrating. But, one of the last strongholds of the Khmer Rouge, some Cambodians still consider Pol Pot a powerful figure to be worshipped. Sek Navuoch kneels in front of a simple-looking grave covered by a tin roof and bordered by glass bottles that have been pushed upside down into the dirt. The 32-year-old lights incense and presents bananas and then puts his hands together and prays. Sek Navuoch says he prays at this grave a few times a year for peace of mind and prosperity with his business. Ancestor worship is a tradition among Cambodia’s majority Khmer. But Sek is not praying to just any ancestor, he is prostrating to the infamous Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot. Under Pol Pot, known as “brother number one”, the communist extremists killed as many as two million Cambodians as they attempted to establish a peasant utopia. Pol Pot’s spirit Sek Navuoch says he prays here because he just respects him. He says he does not know if Pol Pot killed people or not. He says he was an old man and is now an ancestor, so he just prays to him for his family to be prosperous. Pol Pot’s grave is just behind Sek’s small convenience store and he says he stumbled onto it after seeing Pol Pot’s relatives praying there. He says business is good and, although he is not sure if it is due to Pol Pot’s spirit, he and his friends will continue to pray to him just in case. Watch: Victim of Khmer Rouge gives tour of notorious prison Un Reth is chief of Sleng Por village in Anlong Veng and a former Khmer Rouge soldier. He lost his left arm fighting for Pol Pot’s revolution. He says Pol Pot was a great man for what he was able to accomplish but he failed to think of people’s suffering. He says those who pray at Pol Pot’s grave are his close relatives or those who had close relations with him. He says they still believe in his policies. Some people even want to have his remains in their house, he says, because they think it will bring them good luck. Like most former Khmer Rouge, Un Reth denies he was ever involved in any atrocities. But he says his colleagues, all of them now dead, admitted to him that they did torture and kill. Ta Mok The home of Khmer Rouge military leader Ta Mok overlooks a picturesque lake bursting with flowers. The occasional canoe drifts by while cows graze near the cement and wood house, which has become a tourist site. Pol Pot and the senior leaders now on trial held some of their final meetings here in the mid 1990s, before the Khmer Rouge split and then dissolved. Seang Sokheng, head of the tourist office and himself a former Khmer Rouge, explains what happened. He says the two groups loyal to Pol Pot and Ta Mok tried to control the Khmer Rouge army. At first Pol Pot was the most powerful man, he says, but later Ta Mok got the armies under his control so he became the most powerful. Ta Mok took Pol Pot into custody and held a show trial. But the fallen leader died in captivity before he could face properly-constituted justice. Ta Mok was arrested a year later and also died before trial. The top four remaining senior political leaders were arrested in 2007 and are now facing charges ranging from torture to genocide at a United Nations-backed tribunal in Phnom Penh. But they range in age from 79 to 85, and some observers are concerned that they may not live long enough to face the verdict for their role in Pol Pot's bloody revolution. Photos by D. Schearf
Okinawa Commemorates 30th Anniversary of Return to Japan - 2002-05-17
Residents of Okinawa this week mark the 30th anniversary of their islands' return to Japanese control. Okinawa remains Japan's poorest prefecture, and its inhabitants continue to have mixed feelings about the heavy U.S. military presence there. Okinawa, a lush, subtropical string of islands, is known for its beautiful beaches and the 38 U.S. military installations there. In 1972, the islands reverted from American to Japanese control. For 27 years they were a U.N. protectorate under U.S. administration. The U.S. took control after it won a fierce and bloody battle toward the end of World War II. More than 100,000 Okinawans, one-third of the population, perished, including numerous teenagers the Japanese conscripted. For many Okinawans, bitter memories of the war color their views toward the Japanese government and the 25,000 U.S. troops based in the prefecture. Among the Okinawans drafted in the war was Masahide Ota. Later he went to the United States for graduate school and became governor of Okinawa years after it reverted to Japanese control. He views the reversion anniversary as a somber occasion. "It is not the time for rejoice for us. Some people may rejoice, not me. We have to think about deeply what has been done and not been done so far, and what should be in the future," he said. Now 76-years-old and a member of Japan's Parliament, Mr. Ota campaigns tirelessly for the reduction of the U.S. military presence on Okinawa. The prefecture is the country's smallest, yet about half of the total U.S. force in Japan lives on Okinawa. He and many other Okinawans want at least some of the U.S. bases transferred to the Japanese mainland. While the bases help support the local economy, several civil crimes by American soldiers have created tensions. In addition, Mr. Ota said many Okinawans believe that the troops are occupying their ancestral lands, a serious concern in a place where ancestor worship is part of the traditional religion. "If the U.S. Japan [security] treaty is so important and people in the mainland think this is absolutely necessary, then they should share the burden and responsibility equally but they do not share," Mr. Ota said. Tokyo has flooded Okinawa with billions of dollars in public works projects, in exchange for tolerating the troops. Okinawa has grown dependent on these handouts and its economy is the weakest of all of Japan's 47 prefectures. Unemployment is almost twice the national average, and tourism, its main industry, has suffered because of Japan's weak economy. Keiichi Inamine, Okinawa's current governor, has said frequently that life for many Okinawans has improved somewhat thanks to the central government's largess. He notes that disparities between Okinawa and the rest of Japan are shrinking. But on the 30th anniversary of Okinawa's return, he tells reporters that he will continue to ask Tokyo to consider cutting the number of U.S. facilities on Okinawa. He, too, has said the burden of the bases should be equally shouldered by all Japanese. Some Okinawans want the bases to remain. Ryunosuke Megumi is a teacher and political commentator who thinks they play a crucial role in maintaining regional peace. He said the U.S. presence is important for the security of Asia. But he says Japanese mainlanders and people in Okinawa do not understand that. He says the military insures regional safety, but some people think they are better protected without it. U.S. officials said they have no plans to reduce the number of troops on Okinawa. But U.S. and Japanese officials have agreed to close a Marine Corps air station on central Okinawa island, and move it elsewhere on the island. But a final agreement has proved elusive. The Okinawa government wants a 15 year limit on the U.S. use of a new facility. Washington rejects that idea, saying it is impossible to ensure that regional threats will not exist in 15 years. Tokyo has been an outspoken supporter of Washington's war on terrorism since the September 11 attacks. Military analysts have said it is unlikely that Japan will pressure the United States to reduce the Okinawa bases anytime soon. Instead, Tokyo offers new incentives to promote local economic development. Under a new law, Tokyo is creating special districts that offer tax breaks to financial and information technology companies that set up on Okinawa. The law also calls for cutting airfares between Okinawa and the rest of the country, and funding a science-oriented graduate school in the prefecture. The new measures may help boost Okinawa's profile, but for many residents, they do not go far enough because they do not address the larger controversy of the U.S. troops based there.
China officials 'buy corpses to meet cremation quota'
Two officials in Guangdong province have been arrested after they allegedly bought corpses from grave robbers to have them cremated, Chinese media say. They said they were trying to ensure government quotas on the number of cremations every month were met. In Chinese tradition, relatives are buried with tombs built so that loved ones can perform ancestor worship. However, the Chinese government has encouraged cremations to save land for farming and development. In June, a resident of Beiliu city in southern China Guangxi region reported that his grandfather's body had been stolen from the graveyard. In July, police in Beiliu arrested a grave robber, surnamed Zhong based on an investigation, official news agency Xinhua said, citing Chinese media. Zhong confessed he had stolen more than 20 corpses from graveyards in local villages at night. He said he put then into bags and transported them into neighbouring Guangdong province. Zhong also alleged that he had sold the bodies to two officials in Guangdong. The two officials, surnamed He and Dong, who were in charge of implementing funeral management reform, were arrested last week. They told police they had bought the corpses to meet the government quota on cremations. Dong is said to have paid 3,000 yuan ($489, ?306) each for 10 corpses. The official surnamed He said he paid 1,500 yuan for each corpse but how many he bought is unknown. The government policy has angered many, especially in rural parts of China, because of the traditional belief that the body must be intact for a peaceful afterlife. Chinese media have reported cases of people committing suicide before the cremation regulations were put in place so that they may get a burial. Other reports have alleged some family members are burying their loved ones in secret to get around the restriction.
Knowledge Graph
Examples
1 Chinese culture has a tradition of ancestor worship. It is also influenced by Taoist and Confucian beliefs, where "the destruction of the body often meant disconnection from family and ancestry, demolition of the place of return, and disappearance of the person," wrote academic Christina Han of the University of Toronto in a paper on cremation.
2 Yet, like so many others, my parents longed for more children, for the kind of large, boisterous clan that Chinese culture, with its rural roots and tradition of ancestor worship, still values so highly.
3 "There is a firm belief [in Japan] that the jellyfish will come and get you after Obon," explains Amy Chavez, who leads an enviable beach-house life on an island in the west of Japan, referring to an ancestor worship holiday in mid-August.