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Updated: November 17, 2018 to 13:53:37
Nuon Chea (left), former Khmer Rouge leader, and Khieu Samphan, former Khmer Rouge chief of state, seated in the hearing room of the Extraordinary Chambers of the Cambodian Courts (ECCC) in their verdict, on the outskirts of Phnom Penh, Cambodia, 16 November 2018. (Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) / Handout via REUTERS)
The last surviving leaders of the Khmer Rouge communist regime who brutally led Cambodia in the 1970s were convicted of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes on Friday by an international tribunal.
Nuon Chea and Khieu Samphan were sentenced to life imprisonment following earlier convictions in a previous trial for crimes against humanity related to forced transfers and mass disappearances. Cambodia does not have a death sentence.
Both men suggested that they were the target of political persecution. Nuon Chea was considered the main ideologue of the Khmer Rouge and the right arm of the last leader of the group, Pol Pot, while Khieu Samphan was the head of state, presenting a moderate polish as public face of the highly secretive group.
The verdict read aloud in the courtroom by Judge Nil Nonn established that the Khmer Rouge had committed genocide against the Vietnamese and Cham minorities. Scholars had debated whether the repression of Shams, a Muslim ethnic minority whose members had resisted modest but futile resistance against the Khmer Rouge, constituted genocide.
Buddhist monks and people arrive at the Extraordinary Chambers of the Cambodian Courts (ECCC) pending verdict on former Khmer Rouge Chief Khieu Samphan and former Khmer Rouge leader "Brother number two, "Nuon Chea, on the outskirts of Phnom Penh, Cambodia, November 16, 2018. Reuters / Samrang Pring
The members of the Cham community were among the large crowd of spectators present at the Friday session.
The court declared Khieu Samphan not guilty of genocide against the Cham, accused of insufficient evidence, although he was found guilty of genocide against the Vietnamese under the principle of joint criminal enterprise, which holds individuals for officials responsible for acts attributed to a group to which they belong.
The Khmer Rouge have sought to achieve an agrarian utopia by emptying cities to create vast rural communities. Instead, their radical policies led to what has been called "self-genocide" through starvation, overwork and execution.
The convictions for crimes against humanity concerned activities in labor camps and cooperatives created by the Khmer Rouge. These offenses include murder, extermination, deportation, slavery, imprisonment, torture, persecution on political, religious and racial grounds, attacks on human dignity, disappearances forced transfers, forced transfers, forced marriages and rape.
DOSSIER – In this undated photo, a man cleans a skull near a mass grave at Chaung Ek torture camp held by the Khmer Rouge in this undated photo. The last surviving Khmer Rouge Communist regime leaders who ruled Cambodia in the 1970s were found guilty of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes on Friday, November 16, 2018, by an international tribunal . (AP Photo / Jeff Widener, File)
Violations of the Geneva Convention governing war crimes included willful killings, torture or inhuman treatment.
Sum Rithy, 65, was one of Friday's audience viewers. She stated that he had been imprisoned for nearly two years under the Khmer Rouge, accusing him of being a CIA spy. His life was spared only because he was a qualified mechanic, able to maintain the engines and generators of his captors.
Rithy said three of his siblings had been killed by the Khmer Rouge, also accused of CIA spying, while his father was starving.
"Today, I am very happy that the two leaders of the Khmer Rouge have been sentenced to life imprisonment. The verdict was just for me and the other Cambodian victims, "he said. "Last night, I could not sleep because I was afraid Nuon Chea and Khieu Samphan would die before the announcement of this verdict."
REPORT – In this photo of January 9, 1975, Cambodian refugee children wait for their turn at the power station northwest of Phnom Penh, Cambodia. The youths and their families fled the area of Phnom Baseth after raids by nearby Khmer Rouge insurgents. (AP Photo / Kim Heang Tea aka Moonface, File)
Nuon Chea, 92, was brought by ambulance and Khieu Samphan by van to the courthouse from the nearby prison where they are being held. The prison and the courthouse were custom built for the court, which formally appeals to the Extraordinary Chambers of the Cambodian Courts (CETC).
Nuon Chea, who suffers from heart problems, was allowed to move from the hearing room to a separate detention room. Khieu Samphan, 87, attended the entire hearing. With the help of two security guards, he attended the reading of his sentence, showing no obvious emotion.
Nuon Chea's lawyers said they would appeal and Khieu Samphan should do the same.
REPORT – In this 17 April 1975 photo, a Khmer Rouge soldier waves his gun and orders shop owners to abandon their shops in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, while the capital has fallen into the hands of communist forces. (AP Photo / Christoph Froehder, File)
In 2010, the court also sentenced Kaing Guek Eav, known as Duch, head of the Khmer Rouge Penitentiary System, to run the infamous Tuol Sleng torture center in Phnom Penh.
It is to be feared that the policy prevents the court from commencing new lawsuits.
Cambodian autocratic prime minister Hun Sen said he would no longer allow prosecution, saying it would cause instability. Hun Sen was a Khmer Rouge commander who defected when the group was in power and was installed in the government after the Khmer Rouge were ousted by a Vietnamese invasion.
Initial work had been done on two other cases involving four mid-level Khmer Rouge personnel, but they were canceled or blocked by the court, which is a hybrid tribunal in which Cambodian prosecutors and judges are matched with international counterparts. .
The absence of a longer procedure has puzzled some observers, but others underline the court's achievements.
"International tribunals are better than the alternative, impunity. They will always be political and live up to expectations, "said Alexander Hinton, professor of anthropology at Rutgers University and author of two books on the court, before Friday's verdict." But justice is generally, although sometimes, as has been the case with the ECCC, it fails along the finish line. "
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