The horror in Cambodia
Duch is charged in the death of 12,380 men, women and children at the S-21 extermination centre, located around a former school in Phnom Penh. After bogus confessions were extracted from them, most of the victims were taken to Choeng Ek, a killing field in the outskirts of the capital where they were executed with blows to the back of the neck. A memorial stands there now.CHOR SOKUNTHEA
Former Khmer Rouge prison chief Kaing Guek Eav, alias Duch, before the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia on June 29. Now 66 and converted to Christianity, Duch says he was following orders and was afraid for his family. But the tribunal heard that he was an innovator who was eager to please his superiors. A psychologist testified that Duch was insecure and compensated by “demonstrating extreme zeal and allegiance in order to hide his fear, going beyond his masters’ expectations.”Courtesy of Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia
French nurse Martine Lefeuvre said her husband, Ouk Ket, a diplomat at the Cambodian embassy in Dakar, Senegal, returned to his country in 1977 after being recalled by the foreign affairs ministry. The Khmer Rouge were urging expatriate intellectuals to go back and held rebuild the country. When she expressed fear for his safety, “He looked at me and touched my cheek and said, `Mais ma chérie, Cambodians are not savages.’” He died at S-21.
Canadian co-prosecutor Robert Petit. In his opening statement, he told the tribunal that hearing the facts would give back to the victims of the Khmer Rouge the dignity that was denied to them in their last moments. After three years in Cambodia, Mr. Petit resigned, effective this week, citing personal reasons, and will resume his work for the federal Justice Department in Ottawa. “It’s obvious that some people in the government, from the prime minister downward, think they have a right to tell the courts what to do here,” he said in an interview, addressing the issue of political interference in Cambodian courts. “It’s not their job to take that on. It’s mine. It’s the court’s.”Jared Ferrie
The tribunal heard that Duch recruited guards from local farm boys because he deemed them untainted by “capitalist or feudalist influences.” Duch testified that: “Once we educated them, their very nature changed. They went from being gentle beings to people capable of working in situations of extreme cruelty.”
Notorious former Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot leads his guerrilla group in this 1979 file photoReuters/Reuters
Duch's victims included university professor Phung Ton, who had taught him and knew several intellectuals who became top Khmer Rouge officials. The professor's was of the country when the Khmer Rouge took over. Forced into slaw labour on a collective farm, his wife and seven children took comfort in thinking that he was safe. But worried about them, he flew back to be with them. The family discovered his fate in 1979. His daughter Sunthary had bartered for some palm sugar that came wrapped in newspapers. When she looked at the paper, she saw her father's picture among a series of photos of S-21 victims.
The skulls of Khmer Rouge victims are displayed in front of a painting depicting their executions in the Tuol Sleng genocide museum in Phnom Penh.CHOR SOKUNTHEA/Reuters
A foreign tourist looks at photos of Khmer Rouge victims on display at the Tuol Sleng genocide museum in Phnom Penh.TANG CHHIN SOTHY