Lawyer: High Blood Pressure Halts Nuon Chea Questioning

Sok Khemara, VOA Khmer
Original report from Washington
26 September 2007

High blood pressure, exhaustion and dizziness forced Khmer Rouge tribunal investigating judges to stop questioning Nuon Chea Wednesday, his lawyer told VOA Khmer.

Son Arun said the judges halted a court interview after a morning of questioning, when Nuon Chea became dizzy.

His blood pressure was checked and found dangerously high, Son Arun said.

"They dared not to continue questioning him," Son Arun said of co-investigating judges You Bunleng and Marcel Lemonde. "So they let him rest."

Nuon Chea's answers from the session would be stricken from the record, "because my client could not speak properly," Son Arun said.

Nuon Chea had not slept well the night before questioning, and he was frustrated by the repetition of queries from the judges, Son Arun said.

When judges questioned him over the hierarchy of the Khmer Rouge, he could hear almost nothing, Son Arun told Agence France-Presse Wednesday, adding that the judges accused his client of being uncooperative.

After questions about the Khmer Rouge in the 1970s, Nuon Chea had difficulty answering, so Son Arun advised him to stop, the lawyer said.

"I told him not to answer if he could not answer," Son Arun said.

Seng Theary, executive director of Center for Social Development, welcomed the pursuit of the case, but said she wanted to know the details of health care given to Nuon Chea, to avoid suspicion he was being drugged.

Illness halts questioning of KRouge leader: lawyer

PHNOM PENH (AFP) — Rocketing blood pressure and dizziness forced judges with Cambodia's genocide tribunal to stop questioning detained Khmer Rouge leader Nuon Chea Wednesday, his lawyer said.

Attorney Son Arun said his client, who has a history of health problems, could only utter a few words in response to questions from judges with the UN-backed court, who halted the interview after about two hours.

"(Nuon Chea) is not well. When they questioned him heavily he became dizzy," Son Arun told AFP, adding that Nuon Chea's blood pressure was checked during the interview and found to be dangerously high.

Judges Wednesday quizzed Nuon Chea on his role in the Khmer Rouge's hierarchy, Son Arun said.

"He could only answer them with a few words and he could say no more... When the judges questioned him for a while he could not answer correctly and could hear almost nothing," he said, adding that questioning may continue in the afternoon.

"He did not want to say a lot because he said he could not hear clearly," Son Arun said, adding that the judges felt his client was simply being uncooperative.

Nuon Chea, 81, is the oldest of the Khmer Rouge's ageing leaders, all of whom are suffering a variety of ailments, making health a major concern for the court tasked with trying the communist regime's leaders.

The former top lieutenant to Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot, Nuon Chea, who was the regime's chief ideologue, was arrested last week and charged with war crimes and crimes against humanity.

On Tuesday, Nuon Chea's family demanded he be released on bail, saying they doubted the tribunal's ability to care for his health.

A tribunal to try the regime's top leaders got underway last year. Five suspects, including Nuon Chea and former regime prison chief Duch, are under investigation, with public trials expected in 2008.

By the time the communist Khmer Rouge regime fell in 1979 up to two million people had died of starvation, disease, overwork or were executed in one of the worst atrocities of the 20th century.