Khmer Rouge survivor tells of 'killing field' escape

The Times Of India
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com

7 Jul 2009

PHNOM PENH: A survivor of the main Khmer Rouge torture centre told Cambodia's UN-backed war crimes court Tuesday that he escaped a notorious "killing field" despite being knocked into a pit full of dead bodies.

Phork Khan, 57, was testifying at the trial of jail chief Duch, who is accused of overseeing the torture and execution of around 15,000 people who passed through Tuol Sleng prison.

The witness described how he was transported to Choeung Ek, the best known of hundreds of sites in the country where victims of the 1975-1979 regime were killed, after a series of brutal interrogation sessions.

"I was put at the edge of a pit and I knew that would be the last day," Phork Khan told the court as he described kneeling in the former orchard along with other prisoners.

But he said he was merely knocked unconscious into the pit after executioners aimed blows at his knees and ribs, and later awoke underneath dead prisoners.

"My hands were tied, but I tried to crawl moving on top of the other corpses. I was so skinny, I could not even stand or walk properly," he said.

"I could see the bloodstains all over my body and it smelled so bad. Because of the smell, I was about to fall unconscious again and then I got out of the pit," he added.

Phork Khan went on to recount that he heard the sound of guns of invading Vietnamese forces in January 1979 as he left the field at dawn, and was rescued by troops after using a wooden plank to float down a river.

He was the seventh survivor to recount before the court his experiences at Tuol Sleng, although Duch has disputed whether three of the witnesses had indeed been detained at his notorious jail.

The 66-year-old Duch, whose real name is Kaing Guek Eav, begged forgiveness from the victims near the start of his trial for war crimes and crimes against humanity after accepting responsibility for his role in governing the jail.

But he has consistently rejected claims by prosecutors that he held a central leadership role in the Khmer Rouge, and says he never personally executed anyone.

Led by Pol Pot, who died in 1998, the Khmer Rouge emptied Cambodia's cities in a bid to forge a communist utopia. Up to two million people died of starvation, overwork, torture and execution during the 1975-79 regime.

Four other former Khmer Rouge leaders are currently in detention and are expected to face trial next year.