Khmer Rouge trial nears the end and it may be the last of its kind as few senior leaders remain alive
- The Khmer Rouge seized power in 1975 after a bloody five-year civil war. They immediately attempted a transformation of Cambodia into a peasant society
- They backed up their rule with ruthless elimination of perceived enemies, and were driven from power in early 1979 by an invasion from neighbouring Vietnam
The tribunal judging the criminal responsibility of former Khmer Rouge leaders for the deaths of an estimated 1.7 million Cambodians will issue verdicts on Friday in the latest – and perhaps last – of such trials.
Nuon Chea, 92, and Khieu Samphan, 87, are the last two surviving senior leaders of the radical communist group that brutally ruled Cambodia in the late 1970s. They are already serving life sentences after being convicted in a previous 2011-2014 trial of crimes against humanity connected with forced transfers and disappearances of masses of people.
The proceedings against them were split into two successive trials for fear the ageing defendants might die before any verdict was reached in a single, more comprehensive trial and foreclose the opportunity for any sort of justice. The fear was justified – two co-defendants died before the trial was completed.
On Friday, Nuon Chea and Khieu Samphan will be judged on additional charges of crimes against humanity, such as murder, extermination, enslavement, torture and persecution on political, racial, and religious grounds; genocide, for the killings of members of the Vietnamese and Cham ethnic groups; and more breaches of the Geneva Conventions, including wilful killing, torture or inhumane treatment.
As members of the Khmer Rouge leadership under the late Pol Pot, they have been prosecuted under the legal doctrine of joint criminal enterprise, which holds individuals responsible for actions attributed to a group to which they belong.
