Prime Minister Hun Sen said Khmer Rouge officials — some of whom have been convicted of genocide — were easy to have a meal with, something that he would never do with exiled opposition leader Sam Rainsy.
“I wouldn’t hold a glass of champagne and say ‘Cheers.’” A somewhat experimental effort with a $330-million price tag, the Khmer Rouge Tribunal straddled controversy, the pursuit of justice and bitter disappointment before its final verdict against the last-surviving regime leader on trial.
On Thursday morning, the Khmer Rouge tribunal upheld all but two of a slew of convictions against former regime head of state Khieu Samphan, effectively ending the court’s judicial proceedings.
Khmer Rouge head of state Khieu Samphan took the stand for the last time this week to say he was worried for the future of the country during an appeal against his conviction for crimes against humanity.
Khmer Rouge head of state Khieu Samphan’s lawyers on Tuesday appealed against his convictions for exterminating Vietnamese people as lacking in evidence and the regime’s forced marriages as not policy but isolated violations.
Cambodia’s Culture Ministry called out Vice News and a photo editing company after the media outlet featured photos of S-21 prisoners edited to have smiling faces, which Khmer Rouge survivors and family members called traumatizing.
While “Comrade Duch” may be remembered for his dramatic courtroom apologies for his crimes against humanity at the Khmer Rouge detention center, some questioned whether the ex-prison chief’s remorse was genuine.
UPDATED 1:47 p.m. — The former head of Khmer Rouge detention center S-21, Kaing Guek Eav, known by his alias “Duch,” died late Tuesday night in a Phnom Penh hospital, the spokesperson of the tribunal that convicted Duch of crimes against humanity and other crimes said on Wednesday.
UPDATED 5:30 p.m. — The Khmer Rouge tribunal’s Supreme Court Chamber on Tuesday ended appeal proceedings brought by regime second-in-command Nuon Chea, who died last week.
Legal experts and the Khmer Rouge tribunal spokesman said the law requires Khmer Rouge regime second-in-command Nuon Chea’s appeal of his genocide conviction to end following his death last week, calling into question whether the 2018 charges will stand.
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