Under the leadership of Pol Pot, and within days of overthrowing the government, the Khmer Rouge embarked on an organized mission: they ruthlessly imposed an extremist program aimed at rebuilding Cambodia on the communist model of Mao's China. . The population should, they thought, be forced to work as laborers in a vast federation of collective farms. All those who oppose - as were intellectuals and educated people - must be eliminated, along with all non-communist aspects of traditional Cambodian society. Thus, at short notice and under threat of death, the inhabitants of towns and villages were forced to leave. with them. The sick, the disabled, the elderly and the very young were also driven out, regardless of their physical condition: no one was spared from the exodus. People who refused to leave were killed; as well as those who did not leave quickly enough, as well as those who did not obey orders. All political and civil rights were abolished. children were taken from their parents and placed in separate forced labor camps. Factories, faculties and universities were closed; Inc....