From the Classroom Into the World
English
Stanford News Service did a feature article about the Handa Center's internships in Cambodia, highlighting how students apply their coursework and theories in international justice on the ground.
The students – Alina Utrata and Olina Chau – along with fellow student Quito Tsui, spent last summer interning with Stanford’s WSD Handa Center for Human Rights and International Justice in Cambodia through support from the Stanford Global Studies Internship program, which sends more than 80 students to over 20 locations around the world each summer to pursue internships in a variety of fields.
They enter the security line and proceed past the dozens, sometimes hundreds, of Cambodians who have gathered to watch the day’s proceedings. The students then settle into the media room where they will spend the day monitoring Case 002 at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC). The ECCC was established in 2003 to try the senior leaders of the Khmer Rouge for crimes committed during their reign from 1975 to 1979, when about 2 million people are believed to have died from starvation, torture, execution and forced labor.
As part of its effort to engage the next generation in the promotion and protection of human rights around the world, the Handa Center has supported the court’s work from the very beginning. It has done this through trial monitoring, film and television series focused on the proceedings, community dialogues across the country and engagement with local universities. “We saw an opportunity here to play a role in enhancing the impact that the tribunal would have on Cambodian society,” said Handa Center Director David Cohen.