ECCC, Case 001, Issue 1

Case 001

ECCC

Cambodia

English

After several months of anticipation and a decade of negotiations, initial hearings in the case of The Prosecutor v Kaing Guek Eav alias ‘Duch’ were held at the Khmer Rouge Tribunal (‘KRT’) this week, heralding the opening of this unique hybrid tribunal’s first trial. In what was the first instance in which the Trial Chamber had assembled in public, the bench efficiently and effectively ran proceedings under the stewardship of the President Nil Nonn. The two-day hearings focused largely on procedural issues, with the majority of the discussion centering on the parties’ proposed witness lists. Civil party lawyers tended to dominate the proceedings, with the four teams responsible for the current 28 accepted victim participants both raising and rebutting the bulk of issues.

Despite their procedural focus, the hearings were extremely well attended, with the symbolic opening of the trial garnering exceptional amounts of media attention and attendance by people of all ages and walks of life.  Key issues discussed during the proceedings included the proposed addition of videotape evidence recently discovered by the Office of the Co-Prosecutors.  A related issue discussed was whether Khmer Rouge child survivor, Mr Norng Chan Phal, should be allowed to join the proceedings as a civil party. Other significant legal issues raised were: the inclusion of testimony regarding Duch’s role in the Khmer Rouge’s M-13 interrogation facility during the early part of the 1970s (a period outside the temporal jurisdiction of the tribunal); and the inclusion of an expert witness for Civil Party Group 1 (‘CP1’), who is being summoned to assist the court to determine appropriate sentencing vis-à-vis the accused. In an unusual inversion of the clash between common law and civil law interpretations of victims’ rights, lawyer Karim Khan (of the United Kingdom) argued vigorously in favor of victims being allowed greater flexibility with regard to airing their views on sentencing. His French colleagues disagreed with him. A tentative witness list was read out during proceedings, which confirmed that Nyan Chanda, David Chandler and Nic Dunlop would be testifying. As yet, no trial date has been set for the substantive proceedings.