Phnom Penh (dpa) - A tug-of-war over the late Khmer Rouge commander Ta Mok's prosthetic leg between his family and lawyer has ended with a victory for the family and a promise that the leg will now grace a Khmer Rouge museum, his niece Van Ra said Tuesday.
But, Van Ra added, speculation that the fight was not so much over ownership of the leg but of possession of diamonds and gold the former leader was said to have stashed inside it were untrue.
"My uncle knew he would not live to see the trial," Van Ra said, referring to an impending war-crimes trial against Khmer Rouge leaders, "so he joked with his lawyer that maybe he [the attorney] should keep the leg so the government could have a leg to stand trial."
Ta Mok's attorney Benson Samay declined to comment on the tussle, saying that chapter of his career was over and he wanted to move on.
"I was Ta Mok's lawyer. I got nothing," Samay said by telephone. He did not elaborate on why he had sought to keep possession of the prosthesis.
But Van Ra said the lawyer's loss was the public's gain, and the leg, which was custom-made in Thailand after the rebel fighter lost it during a protracted guerilla war against Cambodian government troops in Cambodia's northern jungles, would now take pride of place in a museum honouring him at his former home in Anlong Veng, about 300 kilometres north of Phnom Penh.
"The family are repairing it and decorating it, and it will be on display there soon for everyone to see," she said.
Rumours that the leg had hidden the commander's stash of precious gems and gold were false stories spread by the military to give their troops an added incentive to capture Ta Mok, she said, calling the battle for ownership of the leg purely sentimental and not financial.
She said the leg, made of a black metal compound, was worth little but was of special value to his many loyal followers as a symbol of the man they saw not as a murderer, but as a hero of nationalism.
Ta Mok's death on July 21 at the age of 82 came as a blow to the joint UN-Cambodian government trial of former Khmer Rouge leaders, which began its initial prosecution stage even as Ta Mok was transferred to military hospital with respiratory difficulties and lapsed into a coma. He died after two weeks of treatment.
Nicknamed "The Butcher" for his zeal and ruthlessness, Ta Mok had been kept in virtual solitary confinement in jail for seven years since his capture in 1999, and his death has only seemed to magnify myths surrounding the man and his movement. Many facts and secrets about the shadowy ultra-Maoist Khmer Rouge movement died with him.
Up to 2 million Cambodians died under the Khmer Rouge's 1975-to-1979 Democratic Kampuchea regime. Only a handful of its ageing and mostly ailing former leaders are now expected to face trial on charges of genocide and crimes against humanity.
But, Van Ra added, speculation that the fight was not so much over ownership of the leg but of possession of diamonds and gold the former leader was said to have stashed inside it were untrue.
"My uncle knew he would not live to see the trial," Van Ra said, referring to an impending war-crimes trial against Khmer Rouge leaders, "so he joked with his lawyer that maybe he [the attorney] should keep the leg so the government could have a leg to stand trial."
Ta Mok's attorney Benson Samay declined to comment on the tussle, saying that chapter of his career was over and he wanted to move on.
"I was Ta Mok's lawyer. I got nothing," Samay said by telephone. He did not elaborate on why he had sought to keep possession of the prosthesis.
But Van Ra said the lawyer's loss was the public's gain, and the leg, which was custom-made in Thailand after the rebel fighter lost it during a protracted guerilla war against Cambodian government troops in Cambodia's northern jungles, would now take pride of place in a museum honouring him at his former home in Anlong Veng, about 300 kilometres north of Phnom Penh.
"The family are repairing it and decorating it, and it will be on display there soon for everyone to see," she said.
Rumours that the leg had hidden the commander's stash of precious gems and gold were false stories spread by the military to give their troops an added incentive to capture Ta Mok, she said, calling the battle for ownership of the leg purely sentimental and not financial.
She said the leg, made of a black metal compound, was worth little but was of special value to his many loyal followers as a symbol of the man they saw not as a murderer, but as a hero of nationalism.
Ta Mok's death on July 21 at the age of 82 came as a blow to the joint UN-Cambodian government trial of former Khmer Rouge leaders, which began its initial prosecution stage even as Ta Mok was transferred to military hospital with respiratory difficulties and lapsed into a coma. He died after two weeks of treatment.
Nicknamed "The Butcher" for his zeal and ruthlessness, Ta Mok had been kept in virtual solitary confinement in jail for seven years since his capture in 1999, and his death has only seemed to magnify myths surrounding the man and his movement. Many facts and secrets about the shadowy ultra-Maoist Khmer Rouge movement died with him.
Up to 2 million Cambodians died under the Khmer Rouge's 1975-to-1979 Democratic Kampuchea regime. Only a handful of its ageing and mostly ailing former leaders are now expected to face trial on charges of genocide and crimes against humanity.
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