 UN court may let Khmer Rouge communist leaders get away with mass murder
UNITED NATIONS Ñ More than a quarter century after the crimes were committed, Cambodians who lived through the sanguinary period best known as the Òkilling fields,Ó could at long last see a form of justice. The UN has agreed to set up a court dealing with the dark era known as Democratic Kampuchea. Nonetheless many of the Khmer Rouge communists who systematically directed the genocide between 1975 and 1979, which killed up to two million of their fellow countrymen, may still get away with murder.
The quaintly titled Democratic Kampuchea, masks a bizarrely brutal communist regime whose genocidal credentials rank with Mao, Hitler, and Stalin. The Beijing-backed Pol Pot regime started its vengeful killing spree at the end of the Indochina wars in April/May 1975.
The Khmer Rouge rulers carried out a forced evacuation of cities, forced labor, and an elimination of educated people for fear they would become the political opposition. A minimum of 1.7 million people were killed in an orgy of violence mirroring the worst excesses of ChinaÕs ÒCultural Revolution.Ó The victims and their families still have no justice. Indeed, many former Pol Pot officials such as Ieng Sary and Khieu Samphan live openly inside Cambodia; none have been charged with crimes of genocide.
Now the UN has given the green light to finally establish a ÒmixedÓ court with both international as well as Cambodian judges which will operate within CambodiaÕs own national legal system. The USA and France have pushed for such a tribunal to deal with Pol PotÕs henchmen, lest they die, taking their secrets to the grave.
Superficially the plan sounds like a better late than never solution to bring Cambodians societal closure. In fact Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International have criticized the deal saying it permits the current Phnom Penh government too much leeway to play what comes down to political tricks. Many current Kingdom of Cambodia officials have quiet links to the era under judgment.
While Pol PotÕs forces were ousted from power by VietnamÕs communists in 1979, officials including Premier Hun Sen were former Khmer Rouge who broke with the regime only then to serve in HanoiÕs handpicked government. The depth of disinformation, deceit, and deception concerning the crimes of Democratic Kampuchea Ñ and its perpetrators Ñ has deliberately confounded all but the most persistent investigators.
The number involved in the genocide must be considerable as the execution methods often involved blunt instruments and crude physical beatings. Many former Khmer Rouge once involved in human rights abuses are involved in rackets and smuggling.
The process will be challenged to achieve impartiality. ÒWith CambodiaÕs judiciary at the center of the tribunal, the agreement ensures that it will be politics and not law that will dominate the tribunalÕs work,Ó opined Mike Jendzejczyk of the Asian Division of Human Rights Watch. ÒThe Cambodian government under Hun Sen has a long and wellødocumented record of control, interference, and intimidation in the work of the courts,Ó he added.
Even UN legal officials concede the mixed tribunal process could be Òcumbersome.Ó
Many privately fear that the proposed court fails the test of genuine judicial independence and due process.
In other words, the tribunal will not mirror the Hague process for former Yugoslavia were impartial judges prosecute Serbian and Croatian perpetuators of crimes against humanity in the Balkans. Instead, a court inside CambodiaÑa land still shadowed by the horror and hiding the guilty in the political system, will make some sacrificial offerings on the altar of world conscience.
CambodiaÕs UN delegate Ouch Borith decried Democratic Kampuchea as a Òbarbaric regime which plunged the entire Cambodian society into a human hell and extreme suffering.Ó He stressed ÒIÕll never forget the days when 12 members of my family and more that two million of the Cambodian people were executed and buried in mass graves.Ó
Sadly the majority of victims of the Khmer Rouge killing fields will never see justice but a charade of process Ñ the Khmer Ruse, which will cleverly mask the full face of Democratic Kampuchea. Unfortunately the UN will lend its name to that process.
John J. Metzler is a U.N. correspondent covering diplomatic and defense
issues. He writes weekly for World Tribune.com.
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