Khmer Rouge tribunal may collapse

13-04-2009
By Johan van Slooten
Radio Netherlands Worldwide

Click here to listen to the interview with Victor Koppe

Before its first verdict has even been reached some observers fear the Khmer Rouge tribunal in Cambodia may collapse because of interference by the Cambodian government.

Dutch lawyer Victor Koppe is defending Nuon Chea, one of the highest ranking officials of Cambodia's former Khmer Rouge regime which ruled - and ravaged - the country and its people with a hard hand in the 1970s.

Mr Koppe has just returned from Cambodia after witnessing the first two weeks of the trial against former Khmer Rouge leader Kaing Guek Eav, better known as Duch.

Confessions and corruption

Although the confessions which Duch has made might be seen as a promising sign for the remainder of the trials, Mr Koppe is not so optimistic. He is worried that the tribunal may collapse, especially after last week's statement by Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen in which he said he hopes "the funds for the tribunal will dry up fast". Victor Koppe on the background to this remark:

"The official reason is that the prosecution of former Khmer Rouge figures may lead to increased unrest in some regions. Mr Hu Sen wants to prevent that. There are also accusations that the tribunal is corrupt, which in my opinion is true."

Establishment

But there may be other reasons for Mr Hun Sen's objections to the tribunal, Mr Koppe suspects. Some former Khmer Rouge officers now occupy high positions in Cambodia's political establishment, including Mr Hun Sen's own party.

The government has allegedly tried to influence the tribunal's judges and prosecutors about who should be prosecuted and who should go untried. "Perhaps he doesn't want to upset the applecart too much", Mr Koppe says, adding that even the judges are losing their faith in the tribunal.

Reconciliation

Yet the long anticipated Khmer Rouge tribunal was supposed to provide a way for Cambodia to come to terms with its past. Justice and reconciliation are key factors here. Ending the trials prematurely would dent Cambodia's international reputation, Mr Koppe says:

"Bizarrely, it's Cambodia itself who asked the UN to set up the tribunal. It would be very upsetting if after one trial, the whole tribunal would be done with. It would also be very hard for the international community to swallow."

Some observers now say it would have been better for the tribunal to take place outside Cambodia. But Mr Koppe disagrees:

"I was there during the first hearing at the Duch trial and the public area was fully booked and overcrowded. You wouldn't have that if it was here in The Hague, for instance. So if the structure is solid and everyone is able and allowed to do their work properly, then Cambodia is the best place for this tribunal."

No advantage

If the tribunal were to collapse, those who are to stand trial before it - such as Victor Koppe's client Nuon Chea - would probably be worse off as a result. The Dutch lawyer explains what his client would likely face in that case:

"He would be tried by Cambodian judges rather than international ones, and we think the Cambodians are more biased ... It would lead to some kind of show trial".

Therefore, as Mr Koppe views the situation it's of key importance to both Cambodia and people such as his client that the tribunal continues its work. But it seems that this will require not only its surviving the opposition it is meeting within Cambodia but also, as the Dutch lawyer explains, its continued funding from international donors.

Complaint of Nuon Chea's lawyers dismissed by Phnom Penh's Municipal Court

10-02-2009
By Stéphanie Gée
Ka-set in English

In a notice dated February 5th, the Deputy Prosecutor of the Municipal Court of Phnom Penh, Sok Kalyan, announced to the Defence Team for Nuon Chea, also known as Brother No 2 in the Khmer Rouge hierarchy, that he had dismissed their complaint.

Nuon Chea's foreign lawyers – Andrew Ianuzzi, Michiel Pestman and Viktor Koppe – had filed a complaint, in their names, one month earlier with the Municipal Court to request that it opens an investigation into the graft allegations concerning Cambodian staff at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC). They had then argued that if confirmed, corruption could “undermine the fundamental right to a fair trial” for their client.

The Court's decision is not explained, at least not in the notice, and took the lawyers by surprise, as they had until then had positive meetings with the Court Prosecutor, Ouk Savuth. The latter could not be reached for comment.

While waiting to be communicated the reasons for the decision, Attorney Andrew Ianuzzi said, on Tuesday February 10th, that he and his colleagues would not stop there and were already considering “other options” to explore.

Complaint about corruption allegations at the ECCC: Cambodian judges offended

10-01-2009
Ka-set in English
Click here to read the article in French
Click here to read the article in Khmer

In a communiqué released on Friday January 9th, Cambodian judges at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC), in charge of trying former Khmer Rouge leaders, reacted strongly against the complaint submitted to the Phnom Penh Municipal Court by Nuon Chea's co-lawyers regarding allegations of corruption within the ECCC.

National judges working at the hybrid court, composed of Cambodian and foreign magistrates, say they “deeply regret hearing the new reports today that co-lawyers Mr. Michiel PESTMAN and Mr. Victor KOPPE and Mr. Andrew IANUZZI have filed a complaint with the Municipal Court of Phnom Penh charging corruption within the ECCC, which states that this may infringe the fundamental right to fair trial and that a portion of national judges' salaries are used as kickbacks to government officials”.

Cambodian judges particularly reproached the lawyers for having leaked their action to “the public media”, “causing confusion and seriously affecting the honour and dignity of all individual judges and this institution as a whole”.

In the same release, they go back on the fact that all judges at the ECCC “entered into service by decision of the Supreme Council of Magistracy, chaired by His Majesty the King of the Cambodia”, who signed a Royal Decree appointing them to work in the court.

“Therefore”, the Cambodian judges argue, “there is no reason for judges to cut their salaries to pay kickbacks to government officials, as alleged. We absolutely reject such an accusation.”

Finally, the national ECCC judges state that if the accusation “stems from bad faith in putting the blame on the judges”, they reserve the right “to legal recourse against any individuals who have provoked such a problem”.

The complaint lodged by the Defence Team for former Khmer Rouge Nuon Chea on January 8th was officially registered at the Phnom Penh Municipal Court the morning after it was submitted. It is now up to the Municipal Court to decide whether an investigation on allegations of corruption concerning ECCC Cambodian staff needs to be launched or not.

Dutch Cambodia trial lawyers claim intimidation

Friday 09 January 2009
Radio Netherlands Worldwide (Holland)

Two Dutch lawyers representing a former Khmer Rouge leader at the war crimes trial in Cambodia say they feel intimidated by the judges in the Cambodia tribunal. The lawyers, Victor Koppe and Michiel Pestman, have told Radio Netherlands Worldwide that the judges are threatening legal action against them because they are attempting to expose corrupt practices at the tribunal.

Mr Koppe and Mr Pestman say judges and other court personnel had to buy their appointments by handing over a significant part of their salaries to government officials. The lawyers raised the matter with the Cambodian government, but no action was taken. They then lodged a complaint with a Phnom Penh court. However the judges have threatened to counter with their own legal action, saying the lawyers' complaint was damaging the reputation of the war crimes tribunal.

The two lawyers are representing "Brother Number Two" Nuon Chea, one of five former Khmer Rouge leaders due to stand trial.

Nuon Chea Lawyer Sworn in After Gaffe

By Heng Reaksmey, VOA Khmer
Original report from Phnom Penh
06 February 2008

Victor Koppe, lawyer to jailed Khmer Rouge ideologue Nuon Chea, was sworn in for the Cambodian bar Wednesday morning, following a procedural glitch at a tribunal hearing Monday.

Koppe had filed at least one motion on Nuon Chea’s behalf without technically being eligible under tribunal rules.

Now a member of the bar, he can legally represent Nuon Chea, whose hearing over pre-trial detention was postponed Monday.

“From now on, he has full rights as a lawyer,” Cambodian Bar Association President Ky Tech said.

No new date has been set for the next hearing, which will be only the second of the tribunal.

“It will not take long, as the Pre-Trial Chamber wants to get it done quickly,” tribunal spokesman Reach Sambath said. “There are three more appeals against temporary detentions.”

KRouge leader seeks delay in genocide tribunal hearing

Khmer Rouge leader Nuon Chea (C) sought Monday to delay his first public hearing before Cambodia's genocide tribunal

PHNOM PENH (AFP) — Khmer Rouge leader Nuon Chea sought Monday to delay his first public hearing before Cambodia's genocide tribunal, saying that he needed his foreign lawyer to appeal his detention by the court.

A key member of Nuon Chea's defense team, Dutch attorney Victor Koppe, has yet to be admitted to Cambodia's Bar Association, a requirement for foreign lawyers wishing to represent tribunal defendants.

"If I have only a Cambodian lawyer, it is not consistent with international standards. I believe that if these proceedings go ahead, it is not fair to me," Nuon Chea told tribunal judges.

"I would like to request that the court adjourn the proceedings to a later date," he added, shortly before the judges went behind closed doors to discuss the request.

Nuon Chea, who was Khmer Rouge supreme leader Pol Pot's closest deputy and the alleged architect of the regime's devastating execution policies during its 1975-1979 rule, is charged with war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The court had been scheduled to hear his appeal of his pre-trial detention, which he argues is based on flimsy evidence. The 81-year-old was arrested in September.

But a conflict over his foreign lawyer, Koppe, arose last week when Cambodia's Bar Association refused to admit him.

Bar officials said Koppe signed had court documents before they swore him in, violating the rule that foreign lawyers wishing to represent tribunal defendants must be accepted by the Bar before conducting court business.

On Monday, Nuon Chea's Cambodian lawyer also asked that the hearing be postponed.

"I alone ... cannot accept this hearing because this is an international hearing," Sun Arun said.

Nuon Chea, dressed in a crisp short-sleeved shirt, appeared healthy, standing on his own to answer questions from the judges about his name, age and the names of other family members.

The appearance of the regime's ideologue, the senior-most of the five Khmer Rouge cadre to be arrested so far, marks only the second public hearing since the UN-backed tribunal was convened 18 months ago.

Up to two million people died of starvation and overwork, or were executed by the Khmer Rouge, which dismantled modern Cambodian society in its effort to forge a radical agrarian utopia.

Cities were emptied, their populations exiled onto vast collective farms, while schools were closed, religion banned and the educated classes targeted for extermination.

Khmer Rouge 'Brother No 2' in court

Nuon Chea, former deputy leader of the Khmer Rouge, is appealing against his detention [AFP]

MONDAY, FEBRUARY 04, 2008
Al Jazeera

The most senior surviving leader of the Khmer Rouge leader has appeared for the first time before a United Nations-backed tribunal in Cambodia.

Monday's court appearance by Nuon Chea, the so-called "Brother Number Two" of the Khmer Rouge, was to have heard an appeal against his detention and request for bail.

But a dispute over the 81-year-old's legal team and the accreditation of two Dutch defence lawyers meant the tribunal adjourned the hearing until Wednesday.

The former deputy to Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot - who died in 1998 – Nuon Chea was arrested last September and faces charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity.

He is one of five former Khmer Rouge leaders awaiting trial, expected to start later this year.

Nuon Chea is the second Khmer Rouge senior official to appeal his detention, following a similar move by Kang Kek Iew, also known as Duch, who headed the group's notorious Tuol Sleng prison and interrogation centre.

Duch's appeal was rejected by the court, which said he could attempt to flee the country or interfere with witnesses if he was freed.

Speaking before Monday's court appearance, Son Arun, Nuon Chea's lawyer, said his client "feels an absence of freedom in his detention, where all he does is eat and sleep".

However, the panel of Cambodian and international investigating judges has said it sees Nuon Chea's continued detention as necessary to prevent him from pressuring witnesses or destroying evidence, as well as for his own safety.

The former Khmer Rouge second-in-command is accused of playing a key role in the deaths of some 1.7 million people during the group's 1975-79 rule.

During that period, the Khmer Rouge emptied Cambodia's cities, exiling millions to rural areas in a bid to forge an agrarian utopia, outlawing schools, religion and currency.

The tribunal, convened in 2006, has charged Nuon Chea with "murder, torture, imprisonment, persecution, extermination, deportation, forcible transfer, enslavement and other inhumane acts".

The tribunal is expected to hear documentary evidence that Nuon Chea personally ordered the murder of 14,000 people held at the Tuol Sleng prison, a former Phnom Penh high school.

Nuon Chea surrendered to the Cambodian government in 1998 after the final remnants of the Khmer Rouge collapsed in 1998 and he was given a formal pardon.

In an apology of sorts after the surrender he told reporters: "Naturally, we are sorry, not only for the lives of the people, but also for the animals. They all died because we wanted to win the war."

Jailed Khmer Rouge leader set to fight detention

Khmer Rouge leader Nuon Chea sits at his Pailin, Cambodia, border home in this March 10, 2005 file photo. Nuon Chea, Pol Pot's second in command from 1975 to 1979, is scheduled to appear Monday, Feb. 4, 2008, at a hearing at the U.N.-backed genocide tribunal in Phnom Penh. Chea, along with several other top Khmer Rouge leaders, is in a U.N. detention center in Phnom Penh awaiting trial on crimes against humanity. More than 1.7 million Cambodians were killed, starved or worked to death while the Khmer Rouge was in power. (AP Photo/David Longstreath, File)

03 February 2008
AFP

PHNOM PENH: Former Khmer Rouge leader Nuon Chea is to appeal Monday against his detention by Cambodia's genocide tribunal, insisting there is not enough evidence to keep him behind bars pending trial.

The appearance of the regime's 81-year-old ideologue, the senior-most Khmer Rouge cadre to be arrested, would be only the second public hearing since the UN-backed tribunal was convened 18 months ago.

Nuon Chea, Khmer Rouge supreme leader Pol Pot's closest deputy and alleged architect of the regime's devastating execution policies during its 1975-1979 rule, is charged with war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Up to two million people died of starvation and overwork, or were executed by the Khmer Rouge, which dismantled modern Cambodian society in its effort to forge a radical agrarian utopia.

Cities were emptied, their populations exiled onto vast collective farms, while schools were closed, religion banned and the educated classes targeted for extermination.

Tribunal judges have said they decided to keep Nuon Chea in detention after his September arrest as many documents and witness statements implicated him in crimes committed under the regime.

Nuon Chea's lawyers argue that he should be freed from pre-trial detention due to lack of evidence and because the court judges allegedly violated legal procedures during their first interviews with him.

He was without a lawyer for his first three appearances before the judges, but never properly waived his right to have an attorney present, the lawyers said.

"No reasonable judge under the circumstances would have accepted Mr Nuon's waiver of his right to the assistance of counsel," they wrote in their motion against detention.

They said he was too exhausted from his arrest to understand fully what was happening to him.

His lawyers have also dismissed claims by prosecutors that Nuon Chea, who lived near the former Khmer Rouge stronghold of Pailin, near the Thai border, would flee the country if freed.

"Mr Nuon denied any participation in criminal activity and indicated that, despite having had many chances to do so already, he does not intend to flee and wishes to participate in the proceedings," the lawyers said.

The appeal comes amid a battle over his lawyers' attempts to remove one of the pre-trial chamber judges, military court president Ney Thol. They claim he "is neither independent nor impartial" under a motion filed last week.

Monday's hearing may not go ahead in any case because of a dispute over the make-up of his legal team.

Cambodia's Bar Association -- which must admit foreign lawyers before they can conduct any court business -- refused Friday to accept a Dutch attorney, Victor Koppe, because he had signed last week's motion before being sworn in.

Tribunal officials said last week the Bar's decision would not affect this week's hearing, but another lawyer for Nuon Chea, Cambodian Sun Arun, said at the weekend that he would seek a postponement Monday.

"I cannot do it alone and win," he told AFP Saturday. "It is not possible to proceed with the hearing without foreign lawyers."

The possible delay has alarmed observers who say speedy trials are critical for justice to be served.

All five of the former Khmer Rouge leaders currently in custody are elderly and ill, and there are fears they could die before being put in the dock.

Cambodia's genocide tribunal was convened in 2006 after nearly a decade of fractious talks between the government and United Nations.

But it has been badly hampered by delays, amid infighting among foreign and Cambodian judges as well as attempts by the Cambodian Bar Association to assert its authority over foreign defence lawyers.

Cambodia's judges and lawyers do the government's bidding: Victor Koppe, Nuon Chea's lawyer

Controversy at the Cambodia tribunal: Dutch lawyer debarred after challenging authorities

Victor Koppe

02-02-2008
By our correspondent Michel Maas
Radio Netherlands Worldwide

It had all the hallmarks of a bad omen. The tuk-tuk driver couldn't find Phnom Penh's Royal Palace. It's like a Paris cabbie telling you he doesn't know where the Eiffel Tower is.

Dutch lawyer Victor Koppe was almost late for the session at the appeals court, across from the palace, where he was to be sworn in as a member of the Cambodian bar. An unlikely coincidence, he thought, could this be a conspiracy?

Earlier this week Mr Koppe ruffled feathers by demanding the resignation of one of the Cambodian judges of the UN-backed Khmer Rouge tribunal, due to start its work on Monday.

The judge in question, Ney Thol, is a prominent member of the ruling Communist party and an army general, and presided over Cambodia's military tribunal - not someone to be easily removed.

On Monday, the court is to begin hearing Nuon Chea, the Khmer Rouge's most senior surviving leader, accused of being responsible for the murder of 1.7 million Cambodians between 1975 and 1979.

Of the five top leaders the tribunal is to try, he is the highest-ranking. Also known as "Brother Number Two", Nuon Chea was second-in-command to Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot, who died in 1997.

Unauthorised

It didn't take long before the Dutch lawyer was confronted with the consequences of challenging Cambodia's authorities. On Friday, Cambodia's bar refused to swear him in. By signing a petition requesting the judge's removal before being sworn in, the Dutch lawyer overstepped his bounds and was debarred as a punishment.

Ly Tai Seng, the bar's secretary-general, was quick to deny that his dismissal was a reprisal by the Cambodian government. Unasked, he emphasised there had been "no political pressure".

Tribunal in peril

The bar's ruling threatens to jeopardise the tribunal's procedures. Mr Koppe warned that if the court barred him from defending Mr Chea, no other lawyers would attend the hearing either. And without lawyers, he explained, there can be no hearing.

Brother Number Two Nuon Chea

If the tribunal were to press ahead anyway, that would be "the end of the tribunal's legitimacy". Helen Jarvis, a spokeswoman for the tribunal, however, announced the hearing would go ahead as planned.

Dented image

The row has tarnished the image of the tribunal, which is to begin its hearings after ten years of wrangling between Cambodia and the international community. The request to remove Judge Thol because of his ties with the army and the Communist party has raised doubts about the tribunal's qualifications.

The tribunal falls under Cambodian law and most of its judges are Cambodian. The bar's ruling, concludes Mr Koppe, shows that both Cambodia's judges and lawyers do the government's bidding. Postponing Monday's hearing would only further undermine the tribunal's credibility.

Delay sought for KRouge leader's first public court hearing

Cambodian and international judges and officials

PHNOM PENH (AFP) — Attorneys for Khmer Rouge leader Nuon Chea said Saturday that they want to delay his first public appearance before the genocide tribunal because of a dispute over a foreign lawyer on his team.

The conflict arose after Cambodia's Bar Association last week refused to admit a member of Nuon Chea's defense team, Dutch attorney Victor Koppe.

Nuon Chea, the 81 year-old former regime ideologue charged with war crimes and crimes against humanity, had been expected to appeal his pre-trial detention on Monday.

But one of his lawyers, Cambodian Sun Arun, said he would seek a postponement Monday.

"I cannot do it alone and win," he told AFP. "It is not possible to proceed with the hearing without foreign lawyers."

Bar officials said Koppe signed had court documents before they swore him in, violating the rule that foreign lawyers wishing to represent tribunal defendants must be accepted by the Bar before conducting court business.

Koppe had petitioned for the removal of pre-trial chamber judge Ney Thol, whom he accused of being "neither independent nor impartial."

Ney Thol serves as president of Cambodia's military court and is a member of the ruling Cambodian People's Party central committee.

Tribunal officials said earlier that the Bar Association's decision would not affect the hearing.

But the threat of delay has renewed concerns over the sluggishness of the UN-backed court, which convened in 2006 after nearly a decade of often stalled talks between Cambodia and the world body.

The first arrests were made only last year.

All five of the former regime leaders currently in custody are elderly and ill, heightening fears that they could die before being tried for crimes committed during their 1975-79 communist regime.

Up to two million people died of starvation and overwork, or were executed by the Khmer Rouge, which dismantled modern Cambodian society in its bid to forge a radical agrarian utopia.

Cities were emptied and their populations exiled onto vast collective farms, while schools were closed, religion banned and the educated classes targeted for extermination.

Cambodian Bar Assoc. Retaliation against Dutch Lawyer for demanding the removal of CPP judge?

Cambodia bars Dutch lawyer from addressing genocide tribunal hearing

Friday, February 1, 2008
The Associated Press

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia: A Dutch lawyer for a detained former Khmer Rouge leader will not be allowed to address a U.N.-backed genocide tribunal hearing next week because Cambodia's bar association refused to swear him in, officials said Friday.

The lawyer's association took the action against Victor Koppe, who represents former Khmer Rouge ideologist Nuon Chea, because he breached its rules by acting as his defense counsel before being formally sworn in.

Koppe violated the rules when earlier this week he petitioned the court for the removal of Judge Ney Thol, who sits on the tribunal's pre-trial chamber.

Nuon Chea is scheduled to appear Monday at a hearing on his appeal against his provisional detention by the tribunal, which has charged him with war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The charges are related to his alleged role in the Khmer Rouge atrocities that led to the deaths of some 1.7 million people when the communist movement held power in Cambodia in 1975-79.

Peter Foster, a tribunal spokesman, said the hearing will proceed as planned on Monday, although Sun Arun, another lawyer representing Nuon Chea, said he has already applied for a postponement.

It was unclear whether Koppe would be allowed to represent Nuon Chea at some future point, with the bar association saying it was still considering the matter.

The tribunal has been delayed by many snags, both procedural and political, since Cambodia in 1997 first sought U.N. help to establish it. In 2006 it opened its offices and appointed staff, and only last year did it finally take five former Khmer Rouge leaders into custody pending trial.

In his petition, Koppe had claimed Ney Thol "is neither independent nor impartial" and his judicial record and political background threatened "to undermine the credibility and integrity" of the tribunal.

Ney Thol is a member of the central committee of Prime Minister Hun Sen's ruling Cambodian People's Party as well as president of the military court.

Nuon Chea's lawyer: Ney Thol "is neither independent or impartial"

2008-01-30

Defense lawyers demand removal of Cambodian judge from UN-backed tribunal

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (AP) - A Cambodian judge must immediately be removed from the U.N.-backed tribunal to try former Khmer Rouge leaders because of his dubious judicial record and political background, defense lawyers say.

The lawyers are objecting to Ney Thol, a judge who sits on the tribunal's pre-trial chamber that will hold an appeal hearing Feb. 4 for Nuon Chea, the former Khmer Rouge ideologue.

Ney Thol must be immediately disqualified not just from the upcoming hearing but from all future proceedings because his «continued presence on the bench threatens to undermine the credibility and integrity» of the entire tribunal, said Victor Koppe and Michiel Pestman in a motion received Wednesday.

Five senior Khmer Rouge figures, including Nuon Chea, whose radical policies led to the deaths of an estimated 1.7 million people in the 1970s, were arrested last year and are being held in the capital, Phnom Penh, on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity. Their trials are to start this year.

The two Dutch lawyers said that as an army general heading a military court and a member of Prime Minister Hun Sen's ruling party, Ney Thol «is neither independent or impartial.

Ney Thol declined to comment Wednesday.

Ney Thol is a member of the central committee of Hun Sen's ruling Cambodian People's Party and president of the military court. He is best known for convicting two political opponents of Hun Sen for national security-related crimes.

In 1998 Ney Thol sentenced Prince Norodom Ranariddh, leader of the royalist Funcinpec party at the time, to 30 years in jail for weapons smuggling and conspiring with outlawed Khmer Rouge guerrillas. The trial was mainly prompted by Hun Sen's desire to neuter his main political rival, whom he had already ousted from his position as co-prime minister in a 1997 coup.

In a 2005 trial widely regarded as politically motivated, Ney Thol sentenced an opposition lawmaker to seven years in jail for trying to form an armed group to topple the government. Ney Thol was criticized for his conduct of the trial, in which he barred the defense from calling its own witnesses to testify and not giving it enough time to cross-examine those from the prosecution.

Both Hun Sen's political rivals were later freed by royal pardons.

Ney Thol's «participation in highly questionable judicial decisions would lead a reasonable observer, properly informed, to reasonably apprehend bias against Nuon Chea,» the lawyers said.

Nuon Chea is scheduled to appear before a pre-trial hearing Feb. 4.

He is appealing against his provisional detention at the tribunal, which has charged him with war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The charges are related to his alleged role in the Khmer Rouge atrocities that led to the death of some 1.7 million people when the communist movement held power in Cambodia in 1975-79.

Nuon Chea's lawyer calls for the removal of CPP Ney Thol from the ECCC bench

Ney Thol, the CPP judge, chief of Cambodia's military courts and ECCC judge. He sent opposition MP Cheam Channy to jail in a travesty of justice in 2005.

Nuon Chea Calls for Judge’s Removal

By Sok Khemara, VOA Khmer
Original report from Washington
29 January 2008

The lawyer of jailed Khmer Rouge leader Nuon Chea has called for the removal from the proceedings of judge Ney Thol, who is also the chief of Cambodia’s military courts.

Lawyer Victor Koppe confirmed Tuesday he had filed a motion to disqualify Ney Thol, but Koppe declined to elaborate.

“We are waiting for the response of the prosecution and the decision of the ECCC,” he said, referring to the tribunal by its official name, the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia.

Legal experts said Ney Thol’s dual positions could constitute a conflict of interest, but Ney Thol said Tuesday the motion was “inappropriate.”

Ney Thol recused himself from a hearing for Kaing Khek Iev, alias Duch, in November, because the former prison chief had been held for years under the military courts.

Tribunal spokesman Reach Sambath declined to comment on the motion.

Nuon Chea is to face a hearing for his pre-trial release Feb. 4.