Friday, November 02, 2007

Duch's case to be separated from pack of DK trials

November 02, 2007

Co-investigating judges at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) have announced that the alleged crimes of former S-21 prison chief Kaing Guek Eav, known as Comrade Duch, will be investigated separately from those of other higher-level Democratic Kampuchea (DK) figures, said an ECCC statement received on Friday.

Pre-trial investigation of Duch, charged in July with crimes against humanity, is expected to be concluded as early as the first half of 2008, so that a separation is beneficial and this part of the investigation can be closed without having to await the results of additional investigations, said the statement.

Meanwhile, co-investigating judge Marcel Lemonde told reporters that in comparison to other investigations such as that of Brother Number 2 Nuon Chea, Duch's case is relatively straightforward.

"The alleged crimes for Duch seem to be simpler so it seems possible to investigate them faster than the other," he said.

Duch's appeal against his provisional detention will be heard on November 20, which is ECCC's first courtroom proceedings.

Up to 14,000 were thought to have been tortured and executed at Duch's prison after confessions were forcibly extracted from them, local media said.

The United Nations and the Cambodian government co-installed ECCC two years ago to put former DK leaders on trial, whose regime were widely held responsible for the death of over a million people over starvation and sickness in the late 1990s.

Source: Xinhua

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Here, unless I have good and rational evidences against Dutch, I would just dismissed the case and save all the resources for the big shots.

Anonymous said...

The Duch case is much less poltically sensitive than the Nuon Chea, Khieu Samphan or Ieng Sary cases. The Khieu Samphan case is perhaps the most sensitive. His trial could arouse Khmer nationalism further if he were allowed to talk about the ralionships or conflict between the Khmer Rouge and Vietnam. He is more like Serbian President Moslevich who had been tried and then committed suicide while in detention in The Hague. Moslevich's trial aroused Serb nationalism further and helped his party win the elections back in Serbia.

Anyway, let's see.

LAO Mong Hay, Hong Kong

Anonymous said...

If we talk about Khieu Samphan aka "Lang" we must talk about Sihanouk. Sihanouk's (Kou Roun, Oum Manorin?) police yanked LANG'clothes naked while biking to work...Sihanouk Later joined LANG's clique, conspired, concocted to rid of almost 2 millions of Khmer under the warchful eyes of the Viet: therefore LANG will incriminate Sihanouk and Sihanouk will incriminate the Viet.

Conclusion: LET'S PUT SIHANOUK ON TRIAL!

Anonymous said...

7:18, you can put as many people on trial as you like, but if you down used the resource wisely, the murderer will be free without much effort whatsoever. Right now our chance of convict anyone is rather slim already.