Cambodia: Khmer Rouge

Comrade Duch pleads for clemency



Thursday, November 26, 2009
By Zoe Daniel in Phnom Penh
ABC News (Australia)


The first defendant in Cambodia's Khmer Rouge war crimes trials has made a final plea for clemency as lawyers wind up the case against him.

Comrade Duch has admitted his crimes and apologised to the Cambodian people in the interests of national reconciliation.

But prosecutors say he has only partly confessed and they want him jailed for 40 years.

Duch has listened intently, took notes and occasionally shook his head as the case against him was summarised over more than two days.

When it was his chance to speak through an interpreter, he passionately broke his silence.

"I am deeply remorseful of and profoundly affected by destruction on such a mind-boggling scale," he said.

The former head of the S21 prison is the first of the regime's leaders to come before the specially convened court, more than 30 years after the "Killing Fields" horrors committed by the Khmer Rouge.

But for the families of those killed, the blood is still fresh.

Chim En, 62, says he lost family and friends in S21, and he wants the prison leader punished with a long sentence.

The UN-sanctioned court has heard graphic details of violence against so-called enemies of the extreme communist regime.

Duch is accused of ordering and overseeing his subordinates to mutilate and kill. Babies were bashed to death on tree trunks, men had needles inserted under their fingernails, women were raped with sticks and worse.

Almost no-one left the prison alive.

Prosecutor William Smith says the victims never had the chance to plead their case as Duch has done.

"They were falsely accused and arbitrarily punished," Mr Smith said. "On the contrary, the accused ensured they were treated as animals.

"To him, they were enemies of the state who deserved no mercy and no compassion."

Duch is seeking a shortened sentence because he has apologised to the families of his victims.

He argues that he was acting under orders from his superiors and would have been killed if he had disobeyed.

Duch is now a born-again Christian and says he wants to contribute to national reconciliation.

"For the victims of S21 and their families, I still claim that I am solely and individually liable for the loss of at least 12,380 lives," Duch said

"I still and forever wish to most respectfully and humbly apologise to those dead souls. I have worshipped God to honour the dead."

But both the prosecution and lawyers for ordinary Cambodians who have appeared before the court say his confession has been selective and not completely honest.

Prosecutors are calling for a sentence of 40 years which, for 67-year-old Duch, means the rest of his life. The court will deliberate its verdict until the New Year.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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