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"Killing Fields" torturer on trial in Cambodia
Mon Feb 16, 2009 11:38pm EST
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By Darren Schuettler
PHNOM PENH (Reuters) - The chief Khmer Rouge torturer went on trial for crimes against humanity on Tuesday, the first case involving a senior Pol Pot cadre three decades after the end of a regime blamed for 1.7 million deaths in Cambodia.
Kaing Guek Eav, known as Duch and ex-commandant of the notorious S-21 prison, sat impassively in a blue shirt as a judge read the opening statements in court.
Hundreds of victims of Khmer Rouge atrocities lined up to get into court, but the proceedings are mostly procedural, with the main trial starting in March and a verdict due by September.
Vann Nath, an artist, managed to get a seat near Duch. He was one of only a handful of people to survive S-21, saved because he was chosen to paint portraits of Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot.
"This is the day we have waited for 30 years. But I don't know if it will end my suffering," he told reporters during a break in the hearing.
Duch, now a born-again Christian, expressed remorse on the eve of his trial by the "Killing Fields" court set up to prosecute "those most responsible" for the 1975-79 reign of terror, one of the darkest chapters of the 20th century.
"He said to the victims, 'I ask your forgiveness, I ask your forgiveness'," French lawyer Francois Roux told Reuters Television after visiting his client at a detention center near the specially built court outside the Cambodian capital.
The trial marks a turning point for the strife-torn country where nearly every family lost someone under the Khmer Rouge.
It ends a decade of delays at the Cambodian-U.N. tribunal due to wrangling over jurisdiction and cash, but critics say the court's integrity is threatened by allegations of corruption and political interference over who to prosecute.
A bid to go after other suspects was brushed aside last month by the tribunal's Cambodian co-prosecutor, who said it would not help national reconciliation.
"Any hint of political manipulation at the tribunal will undermine its credibility with the Cambodian people," said Sara Colm, Cambodian-based senior researcher at Human Rights Watch.
Cabinet spokesman Siphan Phay denied any meddling. "We don't want to see this trial fail," he told reporters.
"Success here is a success for human rights, a success for human dignity," he added.
YEAR ZERO
Duch also faces charges of war crimes, torture and homicide while chief of S-21, where at least 14,000 enemies of the revolution were jailed and later killed. Continued...
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