UPDATES TO EDIT PARAS 2-3
By Lauren Crothers
PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (AA) – Cambodia got its “Nuremberg moment” Wednesday when life sentences against the two most senior surviving members of the Khmer Rouge regime were upheld, closing a brutal chapter in the country’s history that began with the forced evacuation of Phnom Penh 41 years ago.
The decision was rendered by a panel of judges in the Khmer Rouge tribunal’s Supreme Court Chamber, who had considered hundreds of pages of appeals filed by chief ideologue Nuon Chea, 90, and former head of state Khieu Samphan, 85, who were found guilty of crimes against humanity in what is known as Case 002/01 in August 2014.
The elderly duo was impassive and stony-faced as they sat side by side in the dock as Judge Kong Srim read the verdict, which contained some variations from the original Trial Chamber ruling from two years before.
In the earlier verdict, they had been found criminally responsible for the evacuation of Phnom Penh on April 17, 1975, a second forced movement of people and the execution of Lon Nol soldiers and officials at a remote, rural site.
On Wednesday, convictions against the pair for crimes committed at that site were reversed, but they were found guilty of murder in relation to the two population movements.
Convictions of the crime against humanity of extermination were reversed by the panel in relation to both of those movements.
The verdict was heralded by Deputy Prime Minister Sok An as an “historic” moment for the country — where around 1.7 million people perished in the agrarian nightmare that began when Khmer Rouge forces battled their way into Phnom Penh, overtook the city from Lon Nol forces and emptied it out on the premise that residents would be able to return a few days later.
That never happened.
Instead, millions of people carved routes out of the sunbaked city on foot, laden with whatever belongings they could carry, bound for rural labor camps and villages in scenes that became emblematic of the regime’s indiscriminate intent to put people to work and squeeze every last grain of rice out of the land.
Speaking to reporters after the verdict, the United Nations’ special expert on the court, David Scheffer, said the verdict was a “Nuremberg moment” in reference to the trials in which Nazi perpetrators were convicted.
“Despite setbacks, the long arm of justice can ultimately prevail,” he said.
The pair is currently being tried in the second phase of Case 002, which is known as Case 002/02, which focuses on crimes of genocide, purges and forced marriage.
In Case 001, S-21 prison jailer Kaing Gek Eav, alias Duch, was jailed for life by the Supreme Court Chamber in 2012.
