dpadpa - International News Service in English
Mar 21, 2008
Phnom Penh (dpa) - The only woman to be held in pre-trial detention by the Khmer Rouge tribunal in Cambodia has requested her appeal for bail be delayed in the interests of justice and human rights, the joint UN-Cambodian court said in a statement Friday.
Legal advocates for Ieng Thirith, also known by her maiden name of Khieu Thirith and revolutionary names of Phea and Hong, asked for a stay of her scheduled appeal in April until late May.
The defense said Diana Ellis, whom Thirith has selected as her international co-lawyer, would be unable to attend the April 21 hearing because of prior commitments.
The inability for Ellis to attend would "lead to a violation of her [Thirith's] fair trial rights" and breach human rights stipulations, according to a defence statement made public by the court.
As the sister-in-law of the movement's late former leader Pol Pot, the former Khmer Rouge social affairs minister Thirith, who is in her late 70s, is accused of being one of the inner circle of the 1975-79 regime.
Her husband and former former foreign minister Ieng Sary is also one of five former Khmer Rouge leaders who have been arrested and charged by the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia.
Up to 2 million Cambodians perished under the Khmer Rouge's Democratic Kampuchea regime, and the five have been charged with human rights abuses and in some cases war crimes by the court.
Thirith's defence request was dated Friday. The court did not say when a decision might be handed down. Thirith has denied the charges against her and faces a yet-to-be-scheduled trial.
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