OUR FOCUS

Cambodia's communities carry the weight of decades of conflict, mass violence, and historical trauma. The legacies of the Khmer Rouge era - silence, stigma, broken social trust, and unhealed wounds - continue to shape people's lives today.

Kdei Karuna works alongside survivors, young people, and communities to address these legacies. We believe that lasting peace is built through dialogue, recognition, and healing - and that those most affected by the past must play an active role in shaping a more just future.

Our work is grounded in four interconnected focus areas:

Survivors & Healing

Thousands of survivors of the Khmer Rouge era continue to live with unrecognized trauma - among them, survivors of conflict-related sexual violence who spent decades in silence. We support survivors in accessing recognition, justice, and healing: through reparative measures, psychosocial support, survivor-led advocacy, and community spaces where people can rebuild trust and dignity.

Memory, Dialogue, Justice & Reconciliation

Understanding the past is essential to building peace. We bring together survivors, former combatants, and young people to engage with Khmer Rouge history through structured dialogue, oral history, and community-based memory work. These exchanges create space for healing, learning, break cycles of silence, and equip communities with the skills to address conflict and prevent its recurrence.

Gender Justice, Youth & Education

Gender-based violence during the Khmer Rouge era remains deeply under-acknowledged. We support communities in breaking the silence around this history - through youth-led dialogue, intergenerational exchange, and education. Young people gain the knowledge and skills to become agents of change: in their schools, families, and communities. Building on this, we empower teachers and future teachers with practical peace skills - nonviolent communication, mediation, gender awareness, oral history documentation, and basic mental-health support - so that classrooms become places where young people learn to prevent violence and carry these values into their communities.

Strengthening Voices & Mobilizing Support

Lasting change requires more than community-level work. Survivors, youth, and communities need spaces to connect with others, share their experiences, and engage with the institutions and decision-makers that shape their lives. Kdei Karuna supports survivors and community members in building the confidence and skills to make their voices heard - believing that those most affected by conflict should play an active role in shaping the responses to it. This includes engaging key stakeholders such as line ministries and local authorities to ensure that survivors' needs remain visible and are reflected in the support available to them. Through active membership in networks and working groups focused on transitional justice, gender justice, and Women, Peace and Security - including the ECCC Victim-Survivors Residual Function Working Group, the CCC Peace Working Group, NGO-CEDAW, the Faith to Action Network, and the International Coalition of Sites of Conscience - we share expertise, exchange good practices, and contribute to broader efforts for recognition, justice, and healing.