APSIG newsletter no. 55: July 2004

Helen Jarvis : drawn to the trials of a country marked by war

There can't be too many Australians who move to another country in response to the personal plea of one of that country's most senior politicians.

But Helen Jarvis, a name well-known to APSIG members, is in just that position.

Cambodia's Sok An, Special Minister for Cabinet and the man who has been driving Phnom Penh's push for a war crimes tribunal to try the surviving leaders of the notorious Khmer Rouge, invited Helen to be his personal adviser after begging for her help in 1999. Soon to be awarded 'Honorary Cambodian citizenship' because of that contribution to her adopted home, Helen now lives with her American husband and three other friends in a traditional-style wooden house on the banks of the Mekong. There, she struggles with the usual day-to-day problems of living in Cambodia. Until recently, the house in a village about 10 km from Phnom Penh, relied on village electricity which sometimes worked and often didn't. Water is pumped up from the river and telephones are expensive and unreliable.

But Helen says the best thing about life there is the unexpected. 'That you get up in the morning and you have no idea what will happen in the course of the day, whether there's a huge political upheaval or the road will be totally flooded and you can't get to work. It drives some people crazy, but others thrive'.

She thought that the job offered to her by Sok An would be technical, involving her designing a program to transfer Khmer Rouge documents to a prosecution brief. She thought it would take six months and secured funding from the Australian government. It turned out to be four years of protracted political and legal negations with the UN on the format of the tribunal. 'I am very happy here, my Cambodian citizenship is a great honour and my work here is more than a full-time job. I see no reason to rush away'.

Helen recently reported that she has now a grand-daughter, Leto, born late last year.

Article with acknowledgement to The Australian's Kimina Lyall.