BACKGROUND: Charges against four Khmer Rouge leaders

Jun 24, 2011
DPA

Phnom Penh - The four surviving leaders of the Khmer Rouge have each been indicted on the same charges: genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and a number of crimes under the 1956 Cambodian Penal Code, which was in force when the movement took over Cambodia in 1975.

The tribunal trying them, known as the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia, said 1.7 million to 2.2 million people died under the movement's rule. It estimated that 800,000 of those deaths were violent with the rest attributed to overwork, starvation and illness.

GENOCIDE

This charge refers specifically to the alleged genocide of two minority populations in Cambodia: the Cham Muslims and ethnic Vietnamese. It does not refer to the mass killings of ethnic Cambodians. To prove genocide, the prosecution must show the intent to destroy in whole or in part a national, ethnic, racial or religious group.

The charge is considered the most difficult to prove. Evidence of mass killings is not sufficient to prove the charge.

CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY

Subsumed within this category are the crimes of murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation, torture, rape and other inhumane acts. Crimes against humanity are acts committed as part of a widespread or systematic attack against a civilian population on national, political, ethnic, racial or religious grounds.

WAR CRIMES

Technically, this charge alleges grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions of 1949. The conventions are designed to protect people and property during international armed conflicts, and breaches of these conventions are referred to as war crimes.

Wilful killing, torture, serious injury and deprivation of the right to a fair trial for prisoners of war or civilians constitute war crimes if proven.

In its first trial, the tribunal found that a state of armed conflict existed between Cambodia and Vietnam from 1975 to 1979 to allow the charges. The defence teams in this case, the tribunal's second, were expected to contest that finding.

CRIMES UNDER THE CAMBODIAN PENAL CODE OF 1956

The tribunal's rules state that it may bring to book anyone who committed homicide, torture and religious persecution during the Khmer Rouge's rule.

The tribunal is limited in its scope to prosecuting crimes committed from the day the Khmer Rouge took Phnom Penh on April 17, 1975, to the day the movement was driven out of Phnom Penh on January 7, 1979, by Vietnamese soldiers and Cambodian rebels.

The Cambodian Penal Code had a 30-year statute of limitations, which meant crimes under national law would have expired before the tribunal's second case began. To avoid that, the tribunal ruled that this 30-year limitation could be extended by a further 30 years.

That ruling to extend the statute of limitations was itself controversial and divided the bench. Defence lawyers in the current case were expected to contest the extension, and it remained uncertain whether the four defendants could be convicted of crimes under Cambodian law.

SENTENCING

The tribunal does not have the death penalty. The maximum sentence is life imprisonment.

TIMING AND POLITICS

Political considerations meant that the role of the United States in bombing Cambodia during the late 1960s, which some historians believe significantly boosted support for the Khmer Rouge, was not investigated because it took place prior to April 17, 1975.

For the same reason, the support of the United States, Thailand, China and other countries for the Khmer Rouge after its 1979 fall from power were also outside the tribunal's scope.

That support allowed Pol Pot's movement to continue a low-level civil war in western Cambodia until the end of the Cold War precipitated the movement's eventual collapse in the 1990s.