By the age of 10, Luong Ung had witnessed the deaths of her parents and two sisters at the hands of the Khmer Rouge. By
1980 the Khmer Rouge had been defeated, so Luong, Meng her brother and his wife, Eang, escaped to Thailand leaving her sister Chou behind. Luong never forgot her sister. The three refugees were
sponsored by a local church to settle in Vemont. Chou distanced from her by 20,000km of ocean seemed impossible to reach. In 1995 she was reunited with Chou in Cambodia. This poignant, tragic but uplifting story of the Cambodian
genocide was described in 2000 in an extraordinary book First they Killed My Father which was rejected by 20 publishers, finally becoming a bestseller.
Luong is today an activist in the campaign against landmines. she is a spokes-woman for te Cambodia Fund, a programme run by Veterans for america, helping disabled Cambodians and amputees. Her new book, After They Killed Our Father (Mainstream), a recent U.K.publication, deals with her separation and reunion with Chou, she had to piece together Chou''s story from their conversations and interviews with family and neighbours.
Luong is strong and confident, she vows to be in Phnomh Penh when the top Khmer Rouge killers are judged in the U.N. sponsored war crimes tribunal for crimes against humanity.