The 27th anniversary of the tragic ambush in Kampong Thom is being commemorated in midst of one of the largest planetary disasters in the last century, the COVID-19 pandemic. This extraordinary situation brings former UN Volunteer Electoral Supervisors, who on 8 April remembered the tragic killing of Atsuhito Nakata and his fellow interpreter Lek Sophiep, back to the very meaning of what took their lives, and gave them, back then, a renewed sense of optimism: at the heart of their UN engagement, what gave them the strength to continue in the face of adversity, the spirit of international cooperation, and going beyond self-interest.