Daily Telegraph
http://www.news.com.au
From correspondent in Phnom Penh
April 20, 2009
A WITNESS at Cambodia's UN-backed war crimes court wept today as he testified that the former prison chief for the Khmer Rouge regime executed his uncle at a secret jungle camp.
Chan Veoun, 56, said he saw the jailer, known as Duch, shoot dead his uncle while he himself worked collecting food at the prison camp, M-13, in the early 1970s.
"He was my uncle. He was shot by Duch. He killed him in front of my eyes,'' Chan Veoun said, weeping.
He did not give a reason for the slaying.
Duch - whose real name is Kaing Guek Eav - charged in response that the testimony was fabricated.
Last month Duch apologised at the start of his trial, accepting blame for overseeing the extermination of 15,000 people who passed through the regime's notorious main prison, Tuol Sleng, also known as S-21.
He has maintained however that he never personally executed anyone and has only admitted to abusing two people.
Chan Veoun told the court Duch regularly beat prisoners and once stripped a woman to her waist to burn her breasts with a torch soaked in gasoline.
"I saw him tie the female and take off her shirt and burn the chest of that lady,'' he said.
Once, he added, prisoners kept shackled in pits were left to drown in monsoon season floods.
He went on to describe how staff at the camp would gauge Duch's mood.
"When he spoke to the guards with a straight face, things were okay. But if he had a smile on his face, there were problems,'' Chan Veoun said.
Duch denied his accounts, saying he recognised Chan Veoun but the witness had never worked under him.
"This is a complete fabrication - probably of what he heard and (he) added something on top,'' Duch told the court.
"About the crimes committed at (M-13) I cannot forget it. It is a serious matter that affects me psychologically.''
The court has been hearing evidence about M-13, which Duch ran during the 1971 to 1975 Khmer Rouge insurgency against the then US-backed Government, to better understand Tuol Sleng's organising structure.
The Khmer Rouge were in power in Cambodia from 1975 to 1979, when Duch is accused of supervising Tuol Sleng prison and sending thousands of people to their deaths in the so-called "Killing Fields.''
The former mathematics teacher has denied assertions by prosecutors that he played a central role in the Khmer Rouge's iron-fisted rule.
Duch faces charges of war crimes, crimes against humanity, torture and premeditated murder for his role in the Khmer Rouge.
He faces life in jail at the court, which does not have the power to impose the death penalty.
http://www.news.com.au
From correspondent in Phnom Penh
April 20, 2009
A WITNESS at Cambodia's UN-backed war crimes court wept today as he testified that the former prison chief for the Khmer Rouge regime executed his uncle at a secret jungle camp.
Chan Veoun, 56, said he saw the jailer, known as Duch, shoot dead his uncle while he himself worked collecting food at the prison camp, M-13, in the early 1970s.
"He was my uncle. He was shot by Duch. He killed him in front of my eyes,'' Chan Veoun said, weeping.
He did not give a reason for the slaying.
Duch - whose real name is Kaing Guek Eav - charged in response that the testimony was fabricated.
Last month Duch apologised at the start of his trial, accepting blame for overseeing the extermination of 15,000 people who passed through the regime's notorious main prison, Tuol Sleng, also known as S-21.
He has maintained however that he never personally executed anyone and has only admitted to abusing two people.
Chan Veoun told the court Duch regularly beat prisoners and once stripped a woman to her waist to burn her breasts with a torch soaked in gasoline.
"I saw him tie the female and take off her shirt and burn the chest of that lady,'' he said.
Once, he added, prisoners kept shackled in pits were left to drown in monsoon season floods.
He went on to describe how staff at the camp would gauge Duch's mood.
"When he spoke to the guards with a straight face, things were okay. But if he had a smile on his face, there were problems,'' Chan Veoun said.
Duch denied his accounts, saying he recognised Chan Veoun but the witness had never worked under him.
"This is a complete fabrication - probably of what he heard and (he) added something on top,'' Duch told the court.
"About the crimes committed at (M-13) I cannot forget it. It is a serious matter that affects me psychologically.''
The court has been hearing evidence about M-13, which Duch ran during the 1971 to 1975 Khmer Rouge insurgency against the then US-backed Government, to better understand Tuol Sleng's organising structure.
The Khmer Rouge were in power in Cambodia from 1975 to 1979, when Duch is accused of supervising Tuol Sleng prison and sending thousands of people to their deaths in the so-called "Killing Fields.''
The former mathematics teacher has denied assertions by prosecutors that he played a central role in the Khmer Rouge's iron-fisted rule.
Duch faces charges of war crimes, crimes against humanity, torture and premeditated murder for his role in the Khmer Rouge.
He faces life in jail at the court, which does not have the power to impose the death penalty.
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