More than 30 years after Pol Pot's brutal regime fell, the first of its senior figures will learn his fate tomorrow. Andrew Buncombe reports from Phnom Penh
It has been more than 30 years since Khmer Rouge torturers pulled out Chum Mey's toenails and attached electrodes to his head. Barely a day has passed without him thinking of the dark, awful days he spent inside a notorious jail in which thousands of people were interrogated, beaten and then dispatched for execution.
Often he wonders why he survived when so many died. "For all these years, the suffering and pain of the victims and myself has rung in my ears," he told The Independent on Sunday.
But Mr Mey is poised to take what he believes will be a vital step towards healing. Tomorrow, a court in Cambodia will deliver its verdict on the man who ran Phnom Penh's Tuol Sleng jail, the extraordinary establishment from which some 16,000 people were sent to be bludgeoned to death at killing fields on the edge of the city. Kaing Guek Eav, better known as Duch, is accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity. The 67-year-old ex-teacher, the first of five former Khmer Rouge officials to be tried, will almost certainly receive a lengthy sentence.
Experts who have followed the process say the effort to bring Duch and his associates to trial has been a crucial, if difficult, undertaking. It has sent a message, they say, that such appalling offences will not go unpunished and is proof that justice, however slow, will eventually make an appointment with the guilty. "For Cambodia, it's going to have a positive impact regardless of what the sentence is," said David Chandler, a leading expert on Cambodian history who has served as an adviser to the UN-backed tribunal. "Duch is the first important person to be tried in a court of law. It ends the impunity".
The Khmer Rouge – who swept to power in 1975 when their black-clad fighters ousted US-backed government forces from Phnom Penh – killed up to 1.7 million people through starvation, sickness or execution. In all, their Maoist-inspired revolution, designed to transform Cambodia into a classless, rural-based society, reduced the country's population by a quarter.
Given that so many people here were either personally affected by the Khmer Rouge or knew people who were, the trial of Duch has attracted widespread interest. The proceedings at a specially built court complex on the edge of capital have been broadcast live on several television channels. "We have also had more than 30,000 visitors out here," said Reach Sambath, a senior spokesmen for the so-called Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts in Cambodia (ECCC). "People have been very interested in what is happening".
The Independent
