A Journey Toward Justice

Khavan Sok, ’06
Researcher, Office of 
Co-Investigating Judges, Cambodian Genocide Tribunal

Khavan Sok came to the U.S. when he was just a freshman in high school. He lived in Seattle with family acquaintances, attending a bilingual high school, then moved to Richmond, Virginia, to live with an uncle and complete his senior year of high school. He attended the University of Virginia, graduating in 2002, and took a year off to pursue work as a freelance writer. It was during this time that he discovered a true connection to work dealing with reparations from the Cambodian genocides of 1975–1979. Today, he acts as a researcher for the Office of Co-Investigating Judges on the Cambodian Genocide Tribunal in his home country. Saint Louis Brief spoke with Sok about his journey.

When was the first time you knew you were interested in doing work relating to the Khmer Rouge?

I took a course in Southeast Asia in the tenth grade and wrote a paper on the Khmer Rouge. It piqued my interest in the subject and eventually grew into a passion. After college, I decided to extend my research on the topic and focused my work on it for a full year.

What did you do during your year as a freelancer?

I worked for a small NGO established by Sody Lay, a Cambodian American from Columbia Law School. He started a Web site designed to help other Khmer Cambodian scholars, and everyone who contributed wrote about Cambodian issues.

How did you meet Sody Lay?

I met him through a mutual friend at a conference for a Cambodian filmmaker. He quickly became my mentor. He had a real passion for this work, and was devoted to getting the word out about Cambodian issues.

When did people begin to understand what happened during the Cambodian Genocide?

No one knew exactly what happened until decades later. When the movie “The Killing Fields” came out in 1984, many of the atrocities were illustrated and people began to realize just how serious it was.

Had you done work on Cambodian issues prior to graduating from college?

Yes. I interned with researchers in the Cambodian Genocide Program at Yale the summer of my junior year in college. The last year of the grant (2001), I worked with the Program’s director, Susan Cook. From 1997-2003, the UN was negotiating with the Cambodian government to form a tribunal to prosecute the Khmer Rouge, which received a lot of national attention.  I wrote a research paper that kept track of the negotiation process. That’s how I was discovered. Helen Jarvis, the adviser to the Cambodian government and a crucial person in the negotiation process, knew Susan Cook. Through her, Helen got to know my work. In January of 2003, when the negotiation team from Cambodia came to the UN in New York, I got to work with the team for a week.

They knew I was going to law school, but I still continued working with the Cambodian government. After the first summer of law school I went back to Cambodia and interned for those who worked on the task force in charge of negotiations with the UN. I worked for the secretariat to the task force, helping them draft the code of procedure for the tribunal. This tribunal is a Cambodian court set up within the Cambodian system with UN support. They have to draft a compromise between Cambodian civil procedure and the international civil procedure. The UN wanted a minimum standard in the tribunal or they wouldn’t participate – so the Cambodian government had to pass a new set of legislation to create an extraordinary chamber (the Khmer Rouge court) and come up with a new set of laws and procedures, separate from the current Cambodian procedure.

I also went back the summer of my second year, doing similar work. I’m fortunate to have been in the right place at the right time, getting to know the right people.

Why did you choose to go to law school?

I always try to challenge myself. After my freelance work, I thought of law school as another challenge. I’ve thought about the law since my sophomore year in college. While in school, I loved studying at the law school on campus. I loved being in an intellectual community and talking with law students. They had a career night and everyone talked about the work they did over the summer. A student there went to Cambodia and worked with a family trying to get their land back in a dispute. She worked with a NGO trying to help them. I was amazed at what she’d done and wanted to go back to Cambodia and be a lawyer and help others. That’s when I decided to apply to law school.

I was offered a scholarship to Saint Louis University School of Law and was glad to have a chance to live here the last three years. I wanted to live in a bigger city than Richmond, and St. Louis is one of the biggest cities in the Midwest. I spent a lot of time on the east and west coasts, so living here was a nice change for me.

What are some of your best memories in this country?

I’ve practically grown up here and have thoroughly enjoyed experiencing a different way of life and meeting so many new people. I never saw anyone chew tobacco before coming to this country. And I never saw a Cardinals game before.

What’s your advice to people who wish to pursue a passion, even if it’s one that requires a great deal of sacrifice?
I would say that as long as you’re doing what you like, though the short-term payment may seem minimal, you will often find that even with sacrifice, it’s the right decision. It’s almost never a bad choice to follow your passion.

— As told to Stefanie Ellis