Soldier Defends Tuol Sleng Film

Former Vietnamese Army photographer, Ho Van Tay, right, and reporter Dinh Phong, left, gather with Cambodian Norng Chanphal, 39, along with his daughters Chen Amara, 6, and Chen Kimty, 13, at Toul Sleng Genocide Museum in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, Sunday, Feb 15, 2009. Chanphal was one of five children discovered by the former Vietnamese Army journalists when the infamous S21 prison was liberated in January of 1979. A U.N.-backed genocide tribunal is set to begin on Feb. 17, 2009, to try five Khmer Rouge leaders accused of crimes against humanity. Kaing Guek Eav, the commander of Toul Sleng under the Khmer rouge, also known 'Duch' will be the first leader tried. (AP Photo/Heng Sinith)

By Kong Sothanarith, VOA Khmer
Original report from Phnom Penh
20 February 2009

A Vietnamese soldier and cameraman defended as “true” a film he shot of Tuol Sleng prison during the ouster of the Khmer Rouge, which could be used as evidence in tribunal proceedings.

Ding Phong, now 71, shot footage of Tuol Sleng prison as Vietnamese forces liberated Phnom Penh in Januray 1979, but the film has come under criticism from defense lawyers for former Khmer Rouge leaders facing atrocity crimes trials.

“The documentary shot in Tuol Sleng is true,” Dinh Phong said Thursday, before returning to Vietnam after a six-day visit to Cambodia to deliver his film to researchers. “What we shot 30 years ago is the truth.”

Lawyers for Khmer Rouge prison chief Duch, who is the first to face trial under the tribunal, said the films were not unbiased.

“This is a documentary which has a political character,” said Kar Savuth, an attorney for Duch, or Kaing Kek Iev, who saw his initial trial hearing this week. “It cannot be used [as evidence] in the trial.”

“What he mentioned is an accusation,” Dinh Phong said, denying the political assertion.

Tribunal prosecutor Chea Leang has requested that two Vietnamese filmmakers, who have donated their films to the Documentation Center of Cambodia, be brought before the Trial Chamber of the Khmer Rouge tribunal, to defend their work.

Dinh Phong said Thursday he would only answer questions outside the court.

Cambodia's KRouge trial debates atrocity film

Wednesday, February 18, 2009
By Suy Se

PHNOM PENH (AFP) – Lawyers at the trial of the Khmer Rouge's chief torturer argued Wednesday over the use of a film showing the liberation of the prison where he allegedly oversaw the deaths of 15,000 Cambodians.

Cambodia's UN-backed genocide tribunal launched an initial hearing in the trial of Kaing Guek Eav, better known by the alias Duch, on Tuesday. It wrapped up on Wednesday and full hearings are expected to start next month.

Prosecutors told the court they wanted to introduce as evidence a film shot by Vietnamese forces showing conditions at the prison two days after they helped to drive the Khmer Rouge regime out of Phnom Penh on January 7, 1979.

"It is an absolute must for this trial chamber to have all available evidence," said co-prosecutor Robert Petit, adding that they wanted to call the cameraman and other witnesses related to the video.

However co-defence lawyer Kar Savuth questioned the authenticity of the evidence, and argued it should be considered a Vietnamese propaganda film.

"We the defence regard this video footage as having political motivation in nature to disguise the truth of the nature of the event," he said.

The video shows scenes of horror inside the abandoned prison, which was a former high school, including several bloated corpses strapped to iron bedframes where they were apparently tortured.

It also shows five children who survived the retreat of the Khmer Rouge from the jail by hiding in a pile of washing.

Duch, a former maths teacher now aged 66, could be seen listening impassively to the arguments through headphones on the second day of the tribunal's initial hearing, which is dealing with procedural and legal matters.

Lawyers also presented lists of witnesses, before the chief judge Nil Nonn announced the end of the initial hearing after just a day and a half.

He did not say when the trial would reopen, but court spokeswoman Helen Jarvis said substantive hearings with witness testimony would likely begin in "late March".

"There's greater understanding of how the trial will unfold and what the objectives of various parties are," Jarvis told reporters at the court.

Duch is charged with crimes against humanity, war crimes, torture and premeditated murder, and faces a life sentence. The tribunal cannot impose the death penalty.

He has taken responsibility for his iron-fisted rule at Tuol Sleng prison which was used as a mass torture centre to extract confessions from alleged traitors that they were spies for the CIA, KGB and other foreign powers.

Only a handful of the estimated 15,000 men, women and children sent to the prison are known to have survived. Most were executed and buried in mass graves at the so-called "Killing Fields" in Choeung Ek near the capital.

He has previously expressed regret for his crimes but has said that he was acting under orders from leaders of the 1975-1979 communist Khmer Rouge.

Led by "Brother Number One" Pol Pot, the Khmer Rouge rose to power as a tragic spinoff from the US conflict in Vietnam, emptying Cambodia's cities to take society back to a rural "Year Zero."

Up to two million people were executed or died of starvation and overwork under the movement. The Khmer Rouge were ousted by Vietnamese-backed forces in January 1979. Pol Pot died in 1998.

The Khmer Rouge genocide tribunal was established in 2006 after nearly a decade of wrangling between Cambodia and the United Nations, and has been further delayed by legal arguments and bail hearings.

The government of Cambodian premier Hun Sen, himself a former Khmer Rouge fighter, has been accused of trying to protect the regime's ex-cadres from justice.