Nong Chan Refugee Camp
Encyclopedia
Nong Chan Refugee Camp was one of the earliest organized refugee camps on the Thai
-Cambodia
n border, where thousands of Khmer
refugees sought food and health care after fleeing the Vietnam
ese invasion of Democratic Kampuchea
in 1979. It was destroyed by the Vietnamese military in late 1984, after which its population was transferred to Site Two Refugee Camp
.
camp was established near the Thai village of Ban Nong Chan sometime in the 1950s by Cambodians opposed to the rule of Prince Norodom Sihanouk
. It was populated mainly by bandits and smugglers until the mid-1970s, when refugees fleeing from the Khmer Rouge
formed a resistance movement there. On June 8, 1979 the Thai military transported several thousand refugees from Nong Chan to the border near the temple of Prasat Preah Vihear
where the refugees were forcibly repatriated into a minefield on the Cambodian side of the border.
In late August 1979 Kong Sileah, a former Naval officer, established the MOULINAKA
resistance force at Nong Chan. Kong Sileah insisted that his approximately 100 guerrillas stay separate from the 13,000 civilians in the camp; he became known for integrity in his dealings with aid agencies. Encouraged by the good order of the camp, the ICRC
built a hospital there.
On November 8, 1979 a fight broke out in the camp when a Thai soldier was accused of raping a Khmer woman and was shot to death. The Thai military commander Colonel Prachak Sawaengchit ordered his troops to shell Nong Chan (known at that time as Camp 511), killing about 100 refugees. The incident received international attention because First Lady Rosalynn Carter
was scheduled to visit Sa Kaeo Refugee Camp
on the following day.
and suggested that food should be distributed at Nong Chan for Cambodians to take home to the interior. This initiated the famous “land bridge”, a fairly successful attempt to distribute food, farm tools and seeds to Khmers living inside Kampuchea. Starting on December 12, Ashe and Kong Sileah organized orderly distributions using camp administrators to give between 10 and 30 kilograms of rice
to people arriving from inside Cambodia. These travelers arrived on foot, by bicycle
, and in oxcarts. By Christmas
1979 twelve truckloads of rice were being distributed daily to over 6,000 people.
Van Saren, a warlord in the neighboring camp of Mak Mun who had made a fortune selling rice that had been distributed by aid agencies, decided that Nong Chan represented a threat to his power, as the price of rice fell dramatically once the land bridge began operating. He attacked Nong Chan on December 30, purportedly with the aid of the Royal Thai Army and burned down the hospital. Food distribution
resumed a few days after Van Saren's attack, and by mid-January 10,000 people a day were receiving rice. Kong Sileah left the camp and moved with his soldiers into the interior of occupied Kampuchea, living in rustic conditions in the forest, a factor which may have contributed to his death from cerebral malaria on August 16, 1980. After this, Nong Chan came under the control of Chea Chhut, a warlord with fewer scruples than Kong Sileah.
, ICRC
, the WFP, and several nongovernmental aid agencies to support the seed-distribution program. After a trial distribution of 220 tons of rice seeds at Nong Chan on March 21, World Relief
and CARE each distributed 2000 tons of rice seed to over 68,000 farmers in early April. Many farmers who received seed at Nong Chan complained that they did not have the tools with which to plant the rice. World Relief, Christian Outreach
and Oxfam
responded in May by distributing hoe heads, plow tips, rope, fishnets, and fishhooks, as well as oxcarts. During that month 340,000 people received food and seeds at Nong Chan.
UNICEF and the ICRC were initially opposed to a large seed distribution program because they feared that it would attract farmers permanently into the camps, having made the journey to the border, although others argued that It was the only way to provide farmers with an incentive to remain
on the land. The ICRC was also particularly wary about running a large-scale operation without first
assessing the attitude of the Heng Samrin
government. ICRC therefore attempted to restrict hoarding and to keep the scale of the program small by imposing ceilings on both the total quantities of seed that could be distributed and on levels of distribution in any one day. UNICEF and WFP at first shared ICRC's caution but became more relaxed after it became clear that the Heng Samrin government had no strong objections to the program. Although the Vietnam-backed government in Phnom Penh
refused to allow CARE and ICRC to distribute seed rice inside Kampuchea, officials did not prevent Khmer villagers from traveling to Nong Chan to receive rice, and in a few cases actually encouraged it.
. The 1980 harvest in Kampuchea, although less than half of prewar levels, far exceeded expectations. Approximately 50,000 tons of food rice were also handed out to over 700,000 Cambodians before the food distribution program ended on January 23, 1981. Although critics charge that much of this rice was resold or used to supply troops in both Thailand and Cambodia, the land bridge was considered a success, principally because it encouraged Cambodians to remain on their farms instead of moving to the refugee camps in Thailand. In mid-1980, Robert Patrick Ashe was awarded the MBE
(Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire) for his work among refugees.
hospital. Nong Chan was later recaptured by Thai forces after the Vietnamese withdrew on June 24. Many refugees moved to the nearby Nong Samet Refugee Camp
. On June 26 Robert Ashe, Dr. Pierre Perrin (ICRC Medical Coordinator) and two journalists (George Lienemann and Richard Franken) were captured by the Vietnamese and marched about 25 kilometers inside Kampuchea through torrential rain and with no shelter at night. Ashe later noted, "It was the first holiday I'd had in six months." Arriving in the Cambodian town of Nimitt
he was interrogated by a Vietnamese officer as to whether food aid was going to anticommunist guerrillas, and after four days they were freed and allowed to walk over the bridge at the border back into Thailand http://www.ashefamily.info/old/page89.html.
to join forces with the KPNLF and at the end of 1982 Nong Chan became the KPNLAF’s military headquarters, although Ampil Camp remained the administrative headquarters until it was destroyed in early 1985. Nong Chan housed the KPNLAF’s 3rd, 7th and 9th battalions and a “Special Forces
” unit that was being trained by the SAS
for sabotage
operations inside Cambodia.
Because of its strategic importance to the KPNLAF, 4000 Vietnamese troops supported by artillery
and T-54 tanks attacked Nong Chan again and destroyed it on January 31, 1983. Ground fighting was reported outside the camp between Vietnamese troops based in Cambodia and about 2000 KPNLF guerrillas. At the same time the Vietnamese kept up a steady barrage of shells, rockets and mortars, killing a 66-year-old Thai farmer and damaging several houses and a Buddhist temple in a neighboring Thai village.
A large portion of the 49,000 Khmer in the camp were relocated out of Nong Chan just hours before the Vietnamese assault. Many of the civilians who remained behind were families of KPNLF soldiers. In the midst of the ensuing Vietnamese artillery barrage, Chea Chhut personally led the remaining population of about 24,000 across an open field to safety on the Thai side of the border. Casualties are unknown. Meanwhile MOULINAKA
units were brushed aside, and KPNLF forces withdrew after a 36-hour fight. The Khao-I-Dang
ICRC
hospital received over 100 civilian wounded. Soon, however, the camp was reoccupied and rebuilt.
quarry about four kilometers to the west. A new camp was established at Site 6 (Prey Chan). Many of these refugees ended up in Khao-I-Dang
Holding Center, and the remainder were resettled at Site Two Refugee Camp
in mid-1985.
Thailand
Thailand , officially the Kingdom of Thailand , formerly known as Siam , is a country located at the centre of the Indochina peninsula and Southeast Asia. It is bordered to the north by Burma and Laos, to the east by Laos and Cambodia, to the south by the Gulf of Thailand and Malaysia, and to the...
-Cambodia
Cambodia
Cambodia , officially known as the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia...
n border, where thousands of Khmer
Khmer people
Khmer people are the predominant ethnic group in Cambodia, accounting for approximately 90% of the 14.8 million people in the country. They speak the Khmer language, which is part of the larger Mon–Khmer language family found throughout Southeast Asia...
refugees sought food and health care after fleeing the Vietnam
Vietnam
Vietnam – sometimes spelled Viet Nam , officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam – is the easternmost country on the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is bordered by China to the north, Laos to the northwest, Cambodia to the southwest, and the South China Sea –...
ese invasion of Democratic Kampuchea
Democratic Kampuchea
The Khmer Rouge period refers to the rule of Pol Pot, Nuon Chea, Ieng Sary, Son Sen, Khieu Samphan and the Khmer Rouge Communist party over Cambodia, which the Khmer Rouge renamed as Democratic Kampuchea....
in 1979. It was destroyed by the Vietnamese military in late 1984, after which its population was transferred to Site Two Refugee Camp
Site Two Refugee Camp
Site Two Refugee Camp was the largest refugee camp on the Thai-Cambodian border and, for several years, the largest refugee camp in Southeast Asia...
.
History
A Khmer SereiKhmer Serei
The Khmer Serei, or "Free Khmer", were an anti-communist and anti-monarchist guerrilla force founded by Cambodian nationalist Son Ngoc Thanh.-Origin:...
camp was established near the Thai village of Ban Nong Chan sometime in the 1950s by Cambodians opposed to the rule of Prince Norodom Sihanouk
Norodom Sihanouk
Norodom Sihanouk regular script was the King of Cambodia from 1941 to 1955 and again from 1993 until his semi-retirement and voluntary abdication on 7 October 2004 in favor of his son, the current King Norodom Sihamoni...
. It was populated mainly by bandits and smugglers until the mid-1970s, when refugees fleeing from the Khmer Rouge
Khmer Rouge
The Khmer Rouge literally translated as Red Cambodians was the name given to the followers of the Communist Party of Kampuchea, who were the ruling party in Cambodia from 1975 to 1979, led by Pol Pot, Nuon Chea, Ieng Sary, Son Sen and Khieu Samphan...
formed a resistance movement there. On June 8, 1979 the Thai military transported several thousand refugees from Nong Chan to the border near the temple of Prasat Preah Vihear
Prasat Preah Vihear
Preah Vihear Temple is a Hindu temple built during the reign of Khmer Empire, that is situated atop a cliff in the Dângrêk Mountains, in the Preah Vihear province, Cambodia...
where the refugees were forcibly repatriated into a minefield on the Cambodian side of the border.
In late August 1979 Kong Sileah, a former Naval officer, established the MOULINAKA
Moulinaka
The MOULINAKA was a pro-Sihanouk military organization formed in August 1979 by an armed group on the Thai-Cambodian border.-History:...
resistance force at Nong Chan. Kong Sileah insisted that his approximately 100 guerrillas stay separate from the 13,000 civilians in the camp; he became known for integrity in his dealings with aid agencies. Encouraged by the good order of the camp, the ICRC
International Committee of the Red Cross
The International Committee of the Red Cross is a private humanitarian institution based in Geneva, Switzerland. States parties to the four Geneva Conventions of 1949 and their Additional Protocols of 1977 and 2005, have given the ICRC a mandate to protect the victims of international and...
built a hospital there.
On November 8, 1979 a fight broke out in the camp when a Thai soldier was accused of raping a Khmer woman and was shot to death. The Thai military commander Colonel Prachak Sawaengchit ordered his troops to shell Nong Chan (known at that time as Camp 511), killing about 100 refugees. The incident received international attention because First Lady Rosalynn Carter
Rosalynn Carter
Eleanor Rosalynn Carter is the wife of the former President of the United States Jimmy Carter and in that capacity served as the First Lady of the United States from 1977 to 1981. As First Lady and after, she has been a leading advocate for numerous causes, perhaps most prominently for mental...
was scheduled to visit Sa Kaeo Refugee Camp
Sa Kaeo Refugee Camp
Sa Kaeo Refugee Camp was the first organized refugee relief camp established on the Thai-Cambodian border by the Royal Thai Government with support from international relief agencies including the United Nations. It was opened in October 1979 and closed in early July 1980...
on the following day.
Food distribution
In November 1979 Kong Sileah met with Robert Patrick Ashe, a five-year veteran of humanitarian work in ThailandThailand
Thailand , officially the Kingdom of Thailand , formerly known as Siam , is a country located at the centre of the Indochina peninsula and Southeast Asia. It is bordered to the north by Burma and Laos, to the east by Laos and Cambodia, to the south by the Gulf of Thailand and Malaysia, and to the...
and suggested that food should be distributed at Nong Chan for Cambodians to take home to the interior. This initiated the famous “land bridge”, a fairly successful attempt to distribute food, farm tools and seeds to Khmers living inside Kampuchea. Starting on December 12, Ashe and Kong Sileah organized orderly distributions using camp administrators to give between 10 and 30 kilograms of rice
Rice
Rice is the seed of the monocot plants Oryza sativa or Oryza glaberrima . As a cereal grain, it is the most important staple food for a large part of the world's human population, especially in East Asia, Southeast Asia, South Asia, the Middle East, and the West Indies...
to people arriving from inside Cambodia. These travelers arrived on foot, by bicycle
Bicycle
A bicycle, also known as a bike, pushbike or cycle, is a human-powered, pedal-driven, single-track vehicle, having two wheels attached to a frame, one behind the other. A person who rides a bicycle is called a cyclist, or bicyclist....
, and in oxcarts. By Christmas
Christmas
Christmas or Christmas Day is an annual holiday generally celebrated on December 25 by billions of people around the world. It is a Christian feast that commemorates the birth of Jesus Christ, liturgically closing the Advent season and initiating the season of Christmastide, which lasts twelve days...
1979 twelve truckloads of rice were being distributed daily to over 6,000 people.
Van Saren, a warlord in the neighboring camp of Mak Mun who had made a fortune selling rice that had been distributed by aid agencies, decided that Nong Chan represented a threat to his power, as the price of rice fell dramatically once the land bridge began operating. He attacked Nong Chan on December 30, purportedly with the aid of the Royal Thai Army and burned down the hospital. Food distribution
Food distribution
Food distribution, a method of distributing or transporting food or drink from one place to another, is a very important factor in public nutrition. Where it breaks down, famine, malnutrition or illness can occur...
resumed a few days after Van Saren's attack, and by mid-January 10,000 people a day were receiving rice. Kong Sileah left the camp and moved with his soldiers into the interior of occupied Kampuchea, living in rustic conditions in the forest, a factor which may have contributed to his death from cerebral malaria on August 16, 1980. After this, Nong Chan came under the control of Chea Chhut, a warlord with fewer scruples than Kong Sileah.
Seed distribution
In February 1980 CARE proposed distributing seed rice in addition to food rice. Numerous predictions of a widespread famine in Kampuchea spurred UNICEF, the FAOFão
Fão is a town in Esposende Municipality in Portugal....
, ICRC
International Committee of the Red Cross
The International Committee of the Red Cross is a private humanitarian institution based in Geneva, Switzerland. States parties to the four Geneva Conventions of 1949 and their Additional Protocols of 1977 and 2005, have given the ICRC a mandate to protect the victims of international and...
, the WFP, and several nongovernmental aid agencies to support the seed-distribution program. After a trial distribution of 220 tons of rice seeds at Nong Chan on March 21, World Relief
World Relief
World Relief is an international relief and development agency. Founded in 1944 as the humanitarian arm of the National Association of Evangelicals, World Relief offers assistance to victims of poverty, disease, hunger, war, disasters and persecution. Headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland, the...
and CARE each distributed 2000 tons of rice seed to over 68,000 farmers in early April. Many farmers who received seed at Nong Chan complained that they did not have the tools with which to plant the rice. World Relief, Christian Outreach
Christian Outreach for Relief & Development
CORD - New life after conflictCORD is a humanitarian organisation working with displaced people and communities affected by violent conflicts around the world. Established in 1967 and rooted in Christian faith. Located in Leamington Spa, UK.CORD's key sectors are education and livelihoods...
and Oxfam
Oxfam
Oxfam is an international confederation of 15 organizations working in 98 countries worldwide to find lasting solutions to poverty and related injustice around the world. In all Oxfam’s actions, the ultimate goal is to enable people to exercise their rights and manage their own lives...
responded in May by distributing hoe heads, plow tips, rope, fishnets, and fishhooks, as well as oxcarts. During that month 340,000 people received food and seeds at Nong Chan.
UNICEF and the ICRC were initially opposed to a large seed distribution program because they feared that it would attract farmers permanently into the camps, having made the journey to the border, although others argued that It was the only way to provide farmers with an incentive to remain
on the land. The ICRC was also particularly wary about running a large-scale operation without first
assessing the attitude of the Heng Samrin
Heng Samrin
Heng Samrin is a Cambodian politician. He was the chairman of the People's Republic of Kampuchea and the State of Cambodia , and later vice chairman and chairman of the National Assembly of Cambodia since 2006....
government. ICRC therefore attempted to restrict hoarding and to keep the scale of the program small by imposing ceilings on both the total quantities of seed that could be distributed and on levels of distribution in any one day. UNICEF and WFP at first shared ICRC's caution but became more relaxed after it became clear that the Heng Samrin government had no strong objections to the program. Although the Vietnam-backed government in Phnom Penh
Phnom Penh
Phnom Penh is the capital and largest city of Cambodia. Located on the banks of the Mekong River, Phnom Penh has been the national capital since the French colonized Cambodia, and has grown to become the nation's center of economic and industrial activities, as well as the center of security,...
refused to allow CARE and ICRC to distribute seed rice inside Kampuchea, officials did not prevent Khmer villagers from traveling to Nong Chan to receive rice, and in a few cases actually encouraged it.
What the Land Bridge achieved
The seed distribution at the land bridge finally ended on June 20, having given out some 25,521 tons of seed, along with tools and even fertilizerFertilizer
Fertilizer is any organic or inorganic material of natural or synthetic origin that is added to a soil to supply one or more plant nutrients essential to the growth of plants. A recent assessment found that about 40 to 60% of crop yields are attributable to commercial fertilizer use...
. The 1980 harvest in Kampuchea, although less than half of prewar levels, far exceeded expectations. Approximately 50,000 tons of food rice were also handed out to over 700,000 Cambodians before the food distribution program ended on January 23, 1981. Although critics charge that much of this rice was resold or used to supply troops in both Thailand and Cambodia, the land bridge was considered a success, principally because it encouraged Cambodians to remain on their farms instead of moving to the refugee camps in Thailand. In mid-1980, Robert Patrick Ashe was awarded the MBE
MBE
MBE can stand for:* Mail Boxes Etc.* Management by exception* Master of Bioethics* Master of Bioscience Enterprise* Master of Business Engineering* Master of Business Economics* Mean Biased Error...
(Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire) for his work among refugees.
1980 Vietnamese incursion
On June 23, 1980 about 200 Vietnamese soldiers attacked Mak Mun and Nong Chan, forcing hundreds of refugees back into Kampuchea and executing hundreds more who resisted. Khmer soldiers at Nong Chan put up a vigorous defense, but some 400 refugees were killed and another 458 were treated at Khao-I-DangKhao-I-Dang
Khao-I-Dang Holding Center was a Cambodian refugee camp located 20 km north of Aranyaprathet in Prachinburi Province of Thailand...
hospital. Nong Chan was later recaptured by Thai forces after the Vietnamese withdrew on June 24. Many refugees moved to the nearby Nong Samet Refugee Camp
Nong Samet Refugee Camp
Nong Samet Refugee Camp, also known as 007, Rithisen or Rithysen was one of the largest refugee camps on the Thai-Cambodian border and served as a power base for the KPNLF until its destruction by the Vietnamese military in late 1984....
. On June 26 Robert Ashe, Dr. Pierre Perrin (ICRC Medical Coordinator) and two journalists (George Lienemann and Richard Franken) were captured by the Vietnamese and marched about 25 kilometers inside Kampuchea through torrential rain and with no shelter at night. Ashe later noted, "It was the first holiday I'd had in six months." Arriving in the Cambodian town of Nimitt
Nimitt
Nimitt is a khum of Ou Chrov District in Banteay Meanchey Province in north-western Cambodia.-Villages:* Nimit Muoy* Nimit Pir* Nimit Bei* Nimit Buon* Ou Chrov* Dong aranh* Souriya* Nimit Thmei* Thma Sen* Kun Damrei* Kob Thom...
he was interrogated by a Vietnamese officer as to whether food aid was going to anticommunist guerrillas, and after four days they were freed and allowed to walk over the bridge at the border back into Thailand http://www.ashefamily.info/old/page89.html.
Nong Chan as a base for the KPNLAF
Towards the end of 1980 Chea Chhut was persuaded by General Dien DelDien Del
General Dien Del is a distinguished military figure who directed combat operations in Cambodia, first as a general in the Army of the Khmer Republic and then as a leader of KPNLF guerrilla forces fighting against the Vietnamese occupation .-Early career:Born in the Khmer Krom region of South...
to join forces with the KPNLF and at the end of 1982 Nong Chan became the KPNLAF’s military headquarters, although Ampil Camp remained the administrative headquarters until it was destroyed in early 1985. Nong Chan housed the KPNLAF’s 3rd, 7th and 9th battalions and a “Special Forces
Special forces
Special forces, or special operations forces are terms used to describe elite military tactical teams trained to perform high-risk dangerous missions that conventional units cannot perform...
” unit that was being trained by the SAS
Special Air Service
Special Air Service or SAS is a corps of the British Army constituted on 31 May 1950. They are part of the United Kingdom Special Forces and have served as a model for the special forces of many other countries all over the world...
for sabotage
Sabotage
Sabotage is a deliberate action aimed at weakening another entity through subversion, obstruction, disruption, or destruction. In a workplace setting, sabotage is the conscious withdrawal of efficiency generally directed at causing some change in workplace conditions. One who engages in sabotage is...
operations inside Cambodia.
Because of its strategic importance to the KPNLAF, 4000 Vietnamese troops supported by artillery
Artillery
Originally applied to any group of infantry primarily armed with projectile weapons, artillery has over time become limited in meaning to refer only to those engines of war that operate by projection of munitions far beyond the range of effect of personal weapons...
and T-54 tanks attacked Nong Chan again and destroyed it on January 31, 1983. Ground fighting was reported outside the camp between Vietnamese troops based in Cambodia and about 2000 KPNLF guerrillas. At the same time the Vietnamese kept up a steady barrage of shells, rockets and mortars, killing a 66-year-old Thai farmer and damaging several houses and a Buddhist temple in a neighboring Thai village.
A large portion of the 49,000 Khmer in the camp were relocated out of Nong Chan just hours before the Vietnamese assault. Many of the civilians who remained behind were families of KPNLF soldiers. In the midst of the ensuing Vietnamese artillery barrage, Chea Chhut personally led the remaining population of about 24,000 across an open field to safety on the Thai side of the border. Casualties are unknown. Meanwhile MOULINAKA
Moulinaka
The MOULINAKA was a pro-Sihanouk military organization formed in August 1979 by an armed group on the Thai-Cambodian border.-History:...
units were brushed aside, and KPNLF forces withdrew after a 36-hour fight. The Khao-I-Dang
Khao-I-Dang
Khao-I-Dang Holding Center was a Cambodian refugee camp located 20 km north of Aranyaprathet in Prachinburi Province of Thailand...
ICRC
International Committee of the Red Cross
The International Committee of the Red Cross is a private humanitarian institution based in Geneva, Switzerland. States parties to the four Geneva Conventions of 1949 and their Additional Protocols of 1977 and 2005, have given the ICRC a mandate to protect the victims of international and...
hospital received over 100 civilian wounded. Soon, however, the camp was reoccupied and rebuilt.
Destruction of the camp
Between 1980 and 1984 the camp was a frequent target of Vietnamese attacks. It was finally assaulted by over 2000 Vietnamese troops from the PAVN's 9th Division on November 18, 1984 and definitively abandoned as of November 30 http://www.websitesrcg.com/border/border-history-1.html. The camp's population of 30,000 refugees was evacuated to Site 3 (Ang Sila), a lateriteLaterite
Laterites are soil types rich in iron and aluminium, formed in hot and wet tropical areas. Nearly all laterites are rusty-red because of iron oxides. They develop by intensive and long-lasting weathering of the underlying parent rock...
quarry about four kilometers to the west. A new camp was established at Site 6 (Prey Chan). Many of these refugees ended up in Khao-I-Dang
Khao-I-Dang
Khao-I-Dang Holding Center was a Cambodian refugee camp located 20 km north of Aranyaprathet in Prachinburi Province of Thailand...
Holding Center, and the remainder were resettled at Site Two Refugee Camp
Site Two Refugee Camp
Site Two Refugee Camp was the largest refugee camp on the Thai-Cambodian border and, for several years, the largest refugee camp in Southeast Asia...
in mid-1985.
External links
- Columbia University's Forced Migration website
- Thai-Cambodian Border Camps
- Recollections of Nong Chan by former Vietnamese Refugees (in Vietnamese)
- "Courage," Article on Robert Patrick Ashe's capture by Vietnamese soldiers, Coventry Evening Telegraph, March 10, 1981.
- "Mr. Robert's Refugees," article by Victoria Butler on Robert Patrick Ashe's Land Bridge in Reader's Digest, February 1983.
- Video in French featuring shots of Sa Kaeo, Khao-I-Dang and Nong Chan and an interview with Kong Sileah some 40 days before his death.
Further reading
- Ho, Minfong (1993) The Clay Marble, a fictional account of a refugee's experiences at Nong Chan Refugee Camp, authored by an aid worker who worked there. Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR).
- Levy, B. S. and D. C. Susott (1987). Years of Horror, Days of Hope: Responding to the Cambodian Refugee Crisis. Millwood, N.Y., Associated Faculty Press.
- Neveu, Roland, and Davies B. Cambodia: The Years of Turmoil. Asia Horizons Books Co., 2000.
- Isaacs A. R. Pawns of War: Cambodia and Laos. Boston, MA: Boston Pub. Co., 1987.
- Thompson, Larry Clinton. Refugee Workers in the Indochina Exodus, 1975-1982. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2010.
- Carney T. M. Kampuchea, Balance of Survival. Bangkok: Distributed in Asia by DD Books, 1981.
- Shawcross W. The Quality of Mercy: Cambodia, Holocaust, and Modern Conscience. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1984.