Declaring Year Zero

Category: Genocide

After the Cambodian monarchy was overthrown, Pol Pot found it somewhat easy, with his Khmer Rouge army, to take over. On April 17, 1975, Pol Pot declared it year zero for Cambodia, and immediately began emptying major cities throughout the country. His communist ideas led him to believe that any intellectual, or any use of technology was a direct threat to his new regime. He captured Phnom Penh on April 17, 1975 and it became one of the biggest cities that he succeeded in evacuating. Once he began moving all the Cambodian people to the outskirts of Cambodia, disconnecting their ties with their cities and homes, he also disconnected all ties with foreigners. He wanted no one to interfere with his "renovation" and "cleansing" of the Cambodian government, and unfortunately, no one did.