Closing Order of Case 002 against Senior KR Leaders Nuon Chea, Khieu Samphan, Ieng Sary, Ieng Thirith

In light of the HISTORIC (!) start of MOST COMPLEX (sic!) trial hearings beginning on   27 June 2011 and again ANOTHER HISTORIC (!) START of this same MOST COMPLEX (sic!) on 21 Nov. 2011 of Case 002 against the surviving Khmer Rouge senior leaders Nuon Chea, Khieu Samphan, Ieng Sary and Ieng Thirith, KI Media is posting installations of the public document of the Closing Order of Case 002 (or, Indictment). The Closing Order of the Co-Investigating Judges forms the basic document from which all the parties (co-prosecutors, lead co-lawyers for all civil parties, defense lawyers) make their arguments before the Trial Chamber judges (one Cambodian President, 2 Cambodian Judges, 2 UN judges). Up until now, the hearings involving these four surviving senior Khmer Rouge leaders have been in the Pre-Trial Chamber over issues of pre-trial detention and jurisdictional issues. Beginning in June November 2011, the Trial Chamber is hearing the substantive (sic!) arguments over the criminal charges   (genocide against Buddhists, genocide against Vietnamese, genocide against Cham Muslims, crimes against humanity at the 200 prisons, mass crimes in countless killing fields, Eastern Zone purges, penal code of 1956, etc.) of only the Phase I Movement in April 1975.

 
 Available in Khmer, English and French. Contact the ECCC for a free copy.  

 

CLOSING ORDER (or, INDICTMENT)

 

of Co-Investigating Judges You Bunleng and Marcel Lemonde

15 September 2010

  PART THREE: LEGAL FINDINGS 

 

XIII. CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY 

 

A.  "CHAPEAU" ELEMENTS 

 

B. UNDERLYING OFFENCES CONSTITUTING CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY

 

  

Other Inhumane Acts Through Forced Marriage

1438.       For each of the incidences listed in the sections "Marriage" and "Factual Findings Crimes", the Co-Investigating Judges find that the constitutive elements of the crime against humanity of other inhumane acts through acts of forced marriage have been established nationwide⁵²⁷³ as well as the worksites 1^st January Dam, Tram Kok Cooperatives and Trapeang Thma Dam, at the Kok Kduoch security centre and in regard to the treatment of the Buddhists.

1439.       With respect to the actus reus, victims endured serious physical or mental suffering or injury or a serious attack on human dignity of a degree of gravity comparable to that of other crimes against humanity. The victims were forced to enter into conjugal relationships in coercive circumstances.

1440.       As regards the mens rea, the perpetrators knew of the factual circumstances that established the gravity of their acts.

1441.       The Co-Investigating Judges find that the incidences of forced marriage, by their nature or consequences, were part of the attack against the civilian population; in particular the imposition of sexual relations aimed at enforced procreation. The perpetrators knew that there was an attack on the civilian population and that their acts were part of it.

1442.       The common purpose aimed at or included the commission of crimes against humanity and other "inhumane acts" by means of forced marriage. The implementation of the common purpose relating to forced marriage was facilitated by the imposition of conjugal relations on victims by the perpetrators of the crimes who were CPK cadres. The Co-Investigating Judges find that the forced marriages assumed a systematic character and constituted an integral part of the common project implemented between April 1975 and 6 January 1976. The widespread character of forced marriages throughout the country clearly indicates hat they were decided and coordinated by the highest leadership of the CPK in the common purpose. Concerning the main modus operandi, witnesses from different zones report that the representatives of the CPK married people who had similar profiles. The specificity of this process and the evidence that it was applied in different locations demonstrates the existence of a common purpose formulated at the highest level of the CPK regime. Another practice demonstrating that the marriages took place in the framework of the common purpose is the fact that multiple marriages were performed at the same time involving between 20 and 60 couples

1443.        In the majority of cases of forced marriage death threats were made, violence was used and people were even executed if they refused to marry. Many witnesses state that they were too afraid to articulate their objection. Weddings took place devoid of traditional involvement of the parents. There was no respect of the traditional rituals. In some cases one party could request authorization to marry a person they determined, but this does not detract from the element of coercion or force placed on the person so identified. Some witnesses state that they were forced to consummate their union, which corroborates the existence of a common purpose established by the senior leaders of the CPK that marriages were necessary to increase the population.