Choeung Ek's memorial stupa is filled with thousands of skulls - the victims of the Khmer Rouge, executed and buried in the mass graves of the best known killing fields.
About Choeung Ek
Between 1975 and 1979 the Khmer Rouge transported prisoners from S-21 to Choeung Ek and other sites across the country for execution and burial in mass graves. After the regime fell, the graves were partly exhumed, and a memorial stupa was built to house the recovered skulls. The site is now a centre of remembrance and was used in evidence at the genocide tribunal.
Overview Choeung Ek, on the outskirts of Phnom Penh, is the best known of the 'killing fields' where the Khmer Rouge executed and buried those processed through the S-21 prison. The grounds hold the grassed-over hollows of mass graves, and at the centre stands a memorial stupa filled with thousands of skulls of the victims, arranged behind glass.
“Overview Choeung Ek, on the outskirts of Phnom Penh, is the best known of the 'killing fields' where the Khmer Rouge executed and buried those processed through the S-21 prison.”
A Place of Memory Paths lead past the excavated pits and a tree against which executioners are recorded to have killed children. Fragments of bone and cloth still surface from the ground after heavy rain. An audio guide walks visitors through the site with restraint and survivor accounts.
The Experience
A measured audio guide leads you along quiet paths between sunken grave pits and the memorial tree, the tone reflective rather than sensational. The central stupa, tiered with skulls, is overwhelming in its directness. As at Tuol Sleng, the visit is difficult but is consistently described by travellers as necessary.
Why It Matters
Choeung Ek is the most visited of Cambodia's killing fields and a central memorial to the victims of the genocide, preserving physical evidence of the Khmer Rouge's crimes and honouring the dead.
Why Visit
Together with Tuol Sleng it is the essential way to understand what Cambodia endured, and the memorial is handled with dignity. Take the excellent audio guide, visit in the same day as S-21, and allow quiet time at the stupa.
Insider Tips
- 1
Take the audio guide, widely regarded as one of the most thoughtful at any memorial.
- 2
Visit on the same day as Tuol Sleng, which tells the first half of the same story.
- 3
Stay on the marked paths; bone and cloth fragments still surface in the grounds.
- 4
Dress and behave respectfully; this is a place of mourning, not a photo backdrop.
