Khmer Rouge figure charged
BANGKOK, Thailand - A tribunal in Cambodia charged the commandant of the main Khmer Rouge torture house with crimes against humanity Tuesday, bringing the first such charges in a long-delayed trial in the deaths of 1.7 million people in the late 1970s.
The commandant, Kaing Guek Eav, 64, known as Duch, was the leader of the Tuol Sleng prison in Phnom Penh where at least 14,000 men, women and children were tortured and sent to killing fields. Only a handful survived.
Two weeks ago, prosecutors announced that they had submitted to the tribunal a list of five potential defendants for consideration by co-investigating judges, who are authorized to decide on filing formal charges.
The other four names have not been disclosed. In the charges announced Tuesday, the judges said Duch had been placed in “provisional detention,” a phrase they did not explain. A small holding center was recently put in place on the grounds of the tribunal in Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia.
Duch has been the only major Khmer Rouge figure held in prison, on a separate set of charges, since 1999 when he was discovered by a British photographer in rural Cambodia. He was working for a government agency and had become a Christian.
Because of his conversion, “He spoke candidly about his role as Pol Pot’s chief executioner,” said the photographer, Nic Dunlop, referring to the Khmer Rouge leader.
“If he remains true to his words and talks as openly as he did then, he can potentially throw huge light on areas of darkness that have eluded scholars for decades,” said Dunlop, who wrote about Duch in “The Lost Executioner.”
Duch could offer damaging testimony against other potential defendants, who over the years have denied or minimized their roles in the Khmer Rouge rule.
Nearly one-fourth of Cambodia’s population died under the Communist Khmer Rouge, which ruled Cambodia from 1975 to 1979. Many died of disease, overwork or starvation or were killed outright.
Many, notably in Tuol Sleng prison, also known as S-21, were accused of being enemies of the revolution and forced through torture to confess to often fantastic crimes before execution. Researchers have found written orders by Duch regarding torture and killings.
In a government interview in 1999, Duch called himself “an individual with gentle heart caring for justice,” according to a transcript quoted by the Associated Press.
“I was under other people’s command, and I would have died if I disobeyed it,” the transcript reads. “I did it without any pleasure and any fault should be blamed on the leadership, not me.”
This has been an almost universal defense among former Khmer Rouge officials, whatever their rank.
Pol Pot died in 1998, and other leaders have died without being brought to trial.