Enemies of the People

Driven by memories of having lost his family to the Khmer Rouge in the late 1970s, and bewildered as to how his countrymen could have instigated the genocide of around two million compatriots, Thet Sambath – senior reporter on the Phnom Penh Post – headed to Cambodia’s killing fields where he coaxed chilling testimonials from a number of former killers and commanders, including the regime’s Brother Number Two, Nuon Chea.

What’s remarkable about this compelling doc is how Sambath’s gentle questions go so much further than demanding admissions of guilt; in one instance he persuades one former killer – now a harmless villager – to demonstrate, in nauseating detail, the knifing methods they used. This is patient, persistent, probing and fearless journalism of the highest order and it shocks to the core.