PHNOM PENH, Cambodia - A tribunal charged the Khmer Rouge's 78-year-old
former head of state with genocide Friday, adding new momentum to
long-delayed trials against the brutal regime that ruled Cambodia 30 years
ago.
Khieu Samphan was brought before investigating judges of the U.N.-assisted
tribunal, who issued the charges, making him the third former Khmer Rouge
leader this week to be charged with genocide, tribunal spokesman Lars Olsen
said.
On Wednesday, the tribunal charged two other defendants with genocide for
the first time: the group's top ideologist, Nuon Chea, and the former
foreign minister, Ieng Sary.
All three faced charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity, as well
as homicide and torture. They are being held in the tribunal's jail with two
other defendants and are expected to be tried next year.
The tribunal is seeking justice for an estimated 1.7 million people who died
from execution, overwork, disease and malnutrition as a result of the
communist group's policies during its 1975-79 rule.
Olsen said they were charged with involvement in the deaths of members of
the country's ethnic Cham and Vietnamese communities.
Some Chams, who are mostly Muslims, were among the few Cambodians to
actively resist Khmer Rouge rule. The Khmer Rouge brutally suppressed the
rebellions in several villages.
The tribunal tried its first defendant, prison chief Kaing Guek Eav, this
year on charges of crimes against humanity, war crimes, murder and torture.
A verdict is expected early next year.
Kaing Guek Eav, also known as Duch, commanded S-21 prison in Phnom Penh,
where up to 16,000 people were tortured and taken away to be killed. A
verdict is expected next year, and he faces a maximum penalty of life
imprisonment if found guilty. Cambodia has no death penalty.
Olsen said it would be determined later whether one of the other Khmer Rouge
leaders in custody - former Social Affairs Minister Ieng Thirith, the wife
of Ieng Sary - would also be charged with genocide.
Copyright © 2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/8419789.stm
Friday, 18 December 2009
Genocide charge for Khmer Rouge leader Khieu Samphan
Khieu Samphan, detained in November,denies repsonsibility
A UN-backed tribunal in Cambodia has charged Khieu Samphan,
formerly the head of state for the Khmer Rouge, with genocide.
The move came after genocide charges were filed against two
other Khmer Rouge leaders, Ieng Sary and Nuon Chea.
All the genocide charges relate to the men's treatment of
Cambodia's Vietnamese and Muslim minorities.
All three men had already been charged with war crimes and
crimes against humanity.
Those charged are already in pre-trial detention although the
trial is not expected to begin before 2011.
Denial
Up to two million people are thought to have died under the
Khmer Rouge's rule.
Khieu Samphan, 78, has never denied these deaths, but both he
and his lawyers insist that, as head of state, he was never directly
responsible.
One member of his defence team is the infamous French lawyer
Jacques Verges, whose previous clients have included Nazi war criminal Klaus
Barbie and Venezuelan hijacker Carlos the Jackal.
Mr Verges, 83, has known Khieu Samphan since they were both
involved in left-wing student activities in France in the 1950s.
WHO WERE THE KHMER ROUGE?
Maoist regime that ruled Cambodia from 1975-1979
Founded and led by Pol Pot, who died in 1998
Abolished religion, schools and currency in a bid to
create agrarian utopia
Up to two million people thought to have died from
starvation, overwork or execution
Brutal Khmer Rouge regime
He says he has lived a life of poverty after the Khmer Rouge
regime was toppled.
A court official confirmed that the allegations were the related
to the treatment of two minority groups: Cham Muslims and ethnic Vietnamese
people.
The accusation of genocide carries enormous symbolic weight,
says the BBC's Guy De Launey in Cambodia's capital, Phnom Penh.
Researchers believe that the Khmer Rouge killed hundreds of
thousands of Chams because of their religious beliefs.
Final arguments were heard last month in the trial of Khmer
Rouge prison chief Kaing Guek Eav, known as Comrade Duch, who has admitted
being responsible for overseeing the deaths of 15,000 people.
Judges at the tribunal are expected to make a ruling on his
verdict early next year.
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About Me
- Duong Dara
- Dara Duong was born in 1971 in Battambang province, Cambodia. His life changed forever at age four, when the Khmer Rouge took over the country in 1975. During the regime that controlled Cambodia from 1975-1979, Dara’s father, grandparents, uncle and aunt were executed, along with almost 3 million other Cambodians. Dara’s mother managed to keep him and his brothers and sisters together and survive the years of the Khmer Rouge regime. However, when the Vietnamese liberated Cambodia, she did not want to live under Communist rule. She fled with her family to a refugee camp on the Cambodian-Thai border, where they lived for more than ten years. Since arriving in the United States, Dara’s goal has been to educate people about the rich Cambodian culture that the Khmer Rouge tried to destroy and about the genocide, so that the world will not stand by and allow such atrocities to occur again. Toward that end, he has created the Cambodian Cultural Museum and Killing Fields Memorial, which began in his garage and is now in White Center, Washington. Dara’s story is one of survival against enormous odds, one of perseverance, one of courage and hope.
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