A Cambodian psychiatrist treating victims of the Khmer Rouge and a French environmentalist cleaning up Indonesian rivers were among the winners of the Ramon Magsaysay Award yesterday.
The annual award, established in 1957 and named after a Philippine president who died in a plane crash, honors those who have performed “selfless service to the peoples of Asia.”
The foundation that runs the award announced four winners in an online announcement.
Photo: AFP
Among them was Sotheara Chhim, 54, a psychiatrist and survivor of the murderous Khmer Rouge regime that killed nearly one-quarter of Cambodia’s population through starvation, overwork and mass executions in the 1970s.
He was cited for devoting his life to helping people who suffered under the Khmer Rouge, with a focus on treating baksbat — “broken courage” — a syndrome seen in Cambodia that is similar to post-traumatic stress disorder.
The Magsaysay Award organizers praised “his calm courage in surmounting deep trauma to become his people’s healer.”
Sotheara Chhim also testified as an expert witness before a UN-backed tribunal trying senior Khmer Rouge leaders.
“I’m ... traumatized myself as a victim under the Khmer Rouge, but working to help survivors of the Khmer Rouge helped me heal myself too,” he said in a 2017 interview.
French environmental advocate and filmmaker Gary Bencheghib, 27, was given the award for his efforts to clean up Indonesia’s polluted waterways.
Bencheghib and his brother have built kayaks made of plastic bottles and bamboo to pick up trash in the Citarum River, one of the most polluted rivers in the world.
Philippine doctor Bernadette Madrid, 64, got the award for setting up child protection centers across the Philippines to help domestic abuse victims.
Japanese opthalmologist Tadashi Hattori, 58, was honored for providing free eye surgeries in Vietnam, where such specialists and facilities are limited.
An in-person ceremony honoring the winners is to be held in Manila in November.
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