For Immediate Release — Wednesday, November 16, 2005
Contact:
Mary E. McCrank
Media Relations Officer
(585) 245-5516
Cambodian Genocide Survivor Dith Pran Reschedules
SUNY Geneseo Visit for Nov. 29
GENESEO, N.Y. — Cambodian genocide survivor Dith Pran,
who had to cancel his visit during Cultural Harmony Week at the State
University of New York at Geneseo due to a flight cancellation, will now visit
the college on Tuesday, Nov. 29.
Pran survived one of the bloodiest genocides in human
history, the Cambodian tragedy set forth by the Communist Khmer Rouge in the
1970s. His story was portrayed in the Academy Award-winning movie "The Killing
Fields." His talk will be at 7 p.m. in 214 Newton Hall. It is free and open to
the public.
Pran and Sydney Schanberg, then a correspondent for The
New York Times, covered the events leading
up to the genocide, including the fall of the capital to the communist Khmer
Rouge. Arrested by the Khmer Rouge, they were sentenced to execution, but
eventually released. Exiled to the killing fields, the forced labor camps in
the Cambodian countryside, Pran endured starvation and torture for four years.
In 1976, Schanberg received a Pulitzer Prize for his coverage of Cambodia, and
he accepted the award for himself and Pran. In October of 1979, Pran escaped to
Thailand and to freedom.
A photojournalist for The
New York Times since 1980, Pran
was appointed as Goodwill Ambassador by the United Nations High Commissioner for
Refugees in 1985. He has testified several times before the Subcommittee on
East Asian and Pacific Affairs of the U.S. Senate and U.S. House of
Representatives, and has received four honorary doctorate degrees. The 1998
Ellis Island Medal of Honor recipient, he is a member of the Asian American
Journalist Association. Tirelessly working to expose the genocide, he compiled
the stories in Children of Cambodia's Killing Fields: Memoirs of Survivors. Determined to educate the world and
assure that the Cambodian genocide is not forgotten, nor repeated, Pran founded
The Dith Pran Holocaust Awareness Project.
For more information about his visit, call (585) 245-5620.
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