Cambodian Trial, Though Grim, Broke New Ground

Kaing Guek Eav, left, sat in the courtroom at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia, during the closing statements in Phnom Penh on Friday. (Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia, via European Pressphoto Agency)

November 29, 2009
By SETH MYDANS
The New York Times

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia — The first trial to showcase the atrocities of the Khmer Rouge three decades ago concluded with the regime’s chief torturer still seemingly unable to grasp the magnitude of his actions. Yet despite that surprising end, the trial may have helped Cambodia begin to move beyond the horrors of its past.

The defendant, Kaing Guek Eav, 67, known as Duch, was the first leading Khmer Rouge figure to be tried in connection with the deaths of 1.7 million people when the brutal Communist regime ruled Cambodia from 1975 to 1979. Throughout the trial, he described in detail his role as the commandant of Tuol Sleng prison, also known as S-21, where at least 14,000 people were tortured and sent to their deaths.

After admitting his guilt and asking for forgiveness, Duch (pronounced DOIK) seemed on the final day of the trial on Friday to think that he had done enough, asking the court to set him free.

Duch’s plea seemed to contradict a carefully constructed strategy to seek leniency by admitting guilt, apologizing and cooperating with the court. He faces a possible term of life in prison for crimes against humanity and other crimes. Prosecutors are seeking a sentence of 40 years, taking into account his cooperation and the five years he already spent in a military jail. The judges are expected to announce a verdict early next year.

Despite long delays and concerns about corruption and possible political interference, “Case One” of the United Nations-backed tribunal mostly overcame doubts that it would meet international standards of justice.

The case broke new ground as a hybrid of national and international justice systems with the support of the United Nations. In another innovation, it included the participation of some victims as “civil parties” represented in court by their own lawyers.

After a slow start, the trial began to draw the attention of a nation that for the past three decades has mostly hidden from the traumas of the Khmer Rouge years. Coinciding with the trial, a new textbook about the Khmer regime began distribution to the high schools, breaking a silence in the education system that has contributed to widespread ignorance.

Human rights groups and legal experts said they hoped the trial would act as an example to help reform Cambodia’s corrupt justice system and erode a culture of impunity, in which powerful people often act beyond the reach of the law.

“The Duch trial itself proceeded methodically and, in the end, was a success,” said Alex Hinton, director of the Center for the Study of Genocide and Human Rights at Rutgers University. “Duch received the fair trial his victims never had.”

A more difficult challenge lies ahead in “Case Two” with the trials of four senior Khmer Rouge leaders who are accused of more far reaching responsibility in the mass killings but against whom the evidence is less concrete.

Unlike Duch, they have denied their guilt and refused to cooperate; their lawyers have already begun complicating the process with legal challenges. Their trial is not expected to get under way until 2012.

Beyond the legal and historical issues examined in the trial, the past nine months have been an exploration of more fundamental questions of human behavior — of guilt and responsibility, and the legal and moral weight of an apology.

“I am accountable to the entire Cambodian population for the souls that perished,” Duch said in a final statement to the court. “I am deeply remorseful and regret such a mind-boggling scale of death.”

But as with a similar statement at the start of the trial, he read on Friday from a prepared text with little sign of emotion, and both the prosecutors and many analysts derided his apology as insincere and tactical.

Nevertheless, “He has apologized and asked to be forgiven, and he has willingly assisted in many aspects of the case,” said Nic Dunlop, the author of a book about Duch called “The Lonely Executioner.”

“We can talk about his lack of empathy. We can talk about his detachment. But these are things he has done that nobody else has done,” Mr. Dunlop said.

For Cambodians who attended the final week of the trial, though, these apologies seemed far too little and the legal fine points of the prosecutors’ request for a reduced sentence seemed irrelevant.

“I can’t accept his apology,” said Peon Tol, 26, a villager who said her grandparents and aunt had been killed by the Khmer Rouge. “It’s not like he was stealing chickens. These crimes are too much to forgive.”

Seung Sophal, 41, a farmer who had traveled here by bus from the countryside, said, “Duch admitted killing people at Tuol Sleng, thousands of people. He committed the crimes and now he is apologizing. It is a little too late to do that.”

Duch’s apologies seemed at odds with the obvious pride he took in his administration of the prison, which the historian David Chandler called “the only institution that functioned” under the Khmer Rouge regime.

“He was an enthusiastic and proud administrator of S-21 who worked out techniques and organizational methodology from scratch,” said Mr. Chandler, who testified at the trial as an expert witness.

Like other analysts, he said Duch seemed to have been motivated by a desire to please his superiors.

“This is not the banality of evil,” Mr. Chandler said. “This guy, he’s a full-time performer. What he is concerned about is the accuracy of his story.”