The streets of Phnom Penh are bustling with tourists. It's no surprise that so many people are drawn to Cambodia's capital -- it is a backpacker's paradise of Buddhist temples and crumbling colonial-era buildings. But behind Cambodia's charm lies a dark history.

Van Naath stands in front of his mug shot taken the day he entered S21 as a prisoner. Photo by Jared Ferrie.

From 1975 to 1979 the Khmer Rouge regime killed as many as 2 million of its own citizens in a deluded attempt to create an agrarian utopia. It's an era that many would like to put behind them. The prime minister, Hun Sen, famously said Cambodians should "dig a hole and bury the past." But the country's brutal history is now pushing its way to the forefront. A handful of former Khmer Rouge leaders are finally being tried in an international war crimes tribunal. The first defendant ran a prison -- now a museum in Phnom Penh -- where about 17,000 people were tortured before being executed.

These days, tourists wander through torture chambers that were once classrooms before the Khmer Rouge turned the school into a prison. The torturers documented their work meticulously, and thousands of photos of the prisoners are now on display. They stare terrified into the camera in black and white mug shots.

When the guards ran out of room to bury corpses on the prison grounds, they started sending prisoners to the outskirts of Phnom Penh, to a site that became known as the Killing Fields. It's open to tourists now too.

It is an oddly tranquil place; the grounds are well-maintained with flowers and big, shady trees. But there are human bones embedded in the pathways, and there's a monument containing thousands of human skulls. Next door is a school. The sound of children laughing and playing seem very much at odds with the violence that once took place there.

It is difficult to reconcile the beauty of this country with such a monstrous legacy. Cambodians themselves have a hard time with that. Many young people do not believe the horrible stories their parents and grandparents have told them. And the first history textbook to include the Khmer Rouge was produced only this year.

With the war crimes tribunal, much of that painful history will be put on very public display. Proponents say the trials are an important step in making peace with the past. But critics wonder why only a handful of elderly former Khmer Rouge leaders are facing trial. It is an open question as to whether the tribunal can deliver justice, coming as it does three decades after one of the worst mass murders of the 20th century.

After visiting S21 and the Killing Fields, I wondered whether justice is even possible. The Khmer Rouge survivors I spoke with had similar questions, but they were, at the very least, happy that the wheels of international justice were finally creaking into motion.

Why do you think it has taken this long to put the Khmer Rouge killers on trial, and how do you think Cambodia -- and the rest of the world -- will benefit from this effort?

Listen to Jared's story on surviving prison in Cambodia.

Watch Jared's slideshow while listening to this story.