In focus: Theary Seng

Renown activist and writer Theary Seng

Theary was born in Phnom Penh in January 1971. Under the Khmer Rouge, she lived in Svay Rieng province bordering Vietnam, where the killings were most intense and where she spent five months in prison. The Khmer Rouge killed both her parents. She and her surviving family trekked across the border for Thailand in November 1979 and emigrated to the U.S. one year later. Since 1995, Theary has been in Cambodia volunteering with various labor and human rights groups. In January 2004, she moved permanently to live and work in her country of birth. By choice, home is once again Cambodia.

Theary graduated from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service with a Bachelor of Science in International Politics in 1995 and from the University of Michigan Law School with a Juris Doctor in 2000. Theary is a member of the New York Bar Association and American Bar Association.

 
Theary has written about her life in a book entitled Daughter of the Killing Fields and is

currently working on a second book. Theary made history when she testified as the first ECCC-recognized civil party against the pre-trial detention hearing of the most senior surviving Khmer Rouge leader, Brother No. 2 Nuon Chea  on February 7, 2008.

Among many other activities, Theary is the founder of CIVICUS (Center for Cambodian Civic Education, www.civicus-cam.org). Theary and her Civil Party of Orphans Class are members of the newly established Association of Khmer Rouge Victims in Cambodia (AKRVC). Theary founded the Voice of Justice radio program (now Voice of Justice & Reconciliation). Theary is the co-host of the popular reality-TV program Youth Leadership Challenge aired on CTN and CTN International for five seasons (2006-2009).

Theary is frequently invited to speak at international conferences all over the world on issues of justice and reconciliation, democracy and human rights, faith in action, and is the subject of countless TV and radio broadcasts on CNN, BBC, AlJazeera, ABC, NHK, VOA, DW, RFA, RFI as well as many documentary films, including a feature film using Theary to tell the larger Khmer Rouge story, currently in production.

To learn more about Theary Seng, visit her website: www.thearyseng.com