Almost a quarter of Cambodia's population -some 1.7 million people - died from torture, starvation and overwork under the radical communist Khmer Rouge regime, which seized power in 1975.

Driven by the distorted dream of turning the Southeast Asian nation into an agrarian peasant utopia, the movement's leader, Pol Pot, evacuated cities and abolished money and private property.

The so-called "Killing Fields" were put to a stop when Vietnam invaded Cambodia in December 1978, driving the Khmer Rouge into the jungle along the border with Thailand. The Vietnamese withdrew in 1989 and elections in 1993 created a fragile democracy.

A UN-backed tribunal comprising both international and Cambodian judges has been set up to try surviving leaders of the Khmer Rouge.

Although it has been plagued by delays and arguments between local and international legal officials, agreement on the court's basic rules were agreed in mid-2007, allowing the tribunal to proceed.

Two senior Khmer Rouge commanders have since been charged with crimes against humanity and prosecutors have launched formal cases against three others.

The World Bank says that the number living in poverty in the country has fallen from 47 to 35 percent over the last decade. But growth has been largely confined to urban areas and illegal logging and drug trafficking are rife. Meanwhile millions of unexploded landmines and HIV/AIDS pose major threats.

Cambodians who died under the Khmer Rouge	1.7 million (Source: The Cambodian Genocide Program, Yale University)
Population living below $1 a day	34.1 percent (UNDP - Human Development Report 2006)
Total number of unexploded landmines/UXO	4-6 million (Cambodian Mine Action Centre (CMAC) Annual report 2005)
Numbers maimed or killed every year	800-900, down from 4,000 in 1996 (CMAC Annual report 2005)