By Stéphanie Gée
21-07-2009
Once again, Monday July 20th, Duch’s trial was lost sight of. Witness Him Huy, suggested to the Chamber by the office of the co-Prosecutors, was taken for the accused. An off-topic detrimental for a better understanding of the overall working of S-21 in light of the important functions fulfilled by the former Khmer Rouge within the killing machine and his willingness to talk. History is being missed, while it should be written by this tribunal and cannot be dissociated from the judicial process. Too eager to question his testimony on points of detail or relating directly to him, the parties discredited the farmer in his fifties who could have unsettled the accused with certain revelations. The defence did not have to make a lot of efforts to belittle his testimony. A genuine gift for Duch, who seemed to take delight in this show.
A former student of Duch in the room
The hearing had not yet opened when the head of the tribunal’s public affairs announced on the microphone, in Khmer, that a “former student of Duch” was in the room. The accused, already sat in his seat behind the glass window, appeared to have heard the message. It took him the morning to spot the student, whom he had not seen since 1968… and greet him from a distance, his hands joined together. The student, surprised, responded to the greeting and confided at lunch time that he had kept of the accused the memory of an excellent mathematics teacher, “serious, strict, simple and appreciated by the students.”
“Were there prisoners who were imprisoned at S-21 and may have been sent to [the re-education centre of] Prey Sar?” Him Huy answered negatively to the question of the Cambodian co-Prosecutor, thereby infirming part of the testimony of civil party Nam Mon, heard a week ago.
“Have you ever heard of a hospital codenamed ‘98’?”, the co-Prosecutor asked. “I never went there, but Duch’s wife was its director at the time.” The answer given by Him Huy was not heard by the interpreters, who signalled it, but nobody reacted until a civil party lawyer intervened to request that the witness be asked to repeat.
Duch: an omnipotent director, according to Him Huy
“No, Duch did not prevent or stop the use of torture,” the former Khmer Rouge stated. “Did you personally criticise Duch?” “I did not dare to criticise him. I was scared of being killed.” “At S-21, did you know who gave orders to Duch?” “At S-21, he was the only one to give orders.” “Did you know if Duch had the authority to release or arrest someone without an authorisation from his hierarchy?” “Yes, he could do all of that because he was the boss.” Whenever he had the opportunity, Him Huy highlighted how the accused was an omnipotent director on his territory.
“I was not happy with this work”
William Smith, the international co-prosecutor, read an extract of the biography that Him Huy had to write in 1977 and in which he stated he “continued to be soft in the realisation of the immediate tasks” and “to be still too lax.” “My biography, like others, was not truthful,” he explained. “We had to include in it everything that was expected from us. I therefore followed the use.”
“At the start, when I arrived at the prison, I saw it and I got scared. […] One day, Son Sen came for a meeting […] and we were all summoned […]. I asked to be reassigned to the army, but my request was denied. I was constantly anxious,” the witness stressed. “Did you like your work at S-21?” “Like I just said, I was not happy with this work, but I had no choice. […] Everyone spied on everyone. There were denunciation reports and everyone was arrested. You had to keep a straight line and be disciplined.”
An enduring fear of Duch
How was Duch perceived by the other staff members? “Duch was rather gentle when he spoke, and polite, but at the same time, extremely firm and meticulous because, as soon as someone was arrested, he applied very strict rules to people arrested, including staff members. Nobody was allowed to take any decision whatsoever to arrest someone. He was the only one who could do so. I believe he was feared by many. Even when I saw him approach on a bicycle, I would find an excuse to move away.”
“Are you still afraid of Duch today?” “Honestly, when I see him, it reminds me of the time I worked with him and I was scared of him. I did not dare to look at him in the eye and, still today, he scares me. Without the liberation of January 7th 1979, I believe I wouldn’t still be here. I would have been killed. Duch had said so: ‘everyone will end up eliminated some day.’” He then started sobbing, briefly.
Questions missing the point…
To the civil party lawyers, Him Huy restated what he had declared as early as 1990, that is he heard, at S-21, “Duch and Hor say: ‘we should kill them all and only keep four millions.’” But once again, the focus was quite lost. As with the co-Prosecutors, the questions followed without the rationale of the approach appearing clearly. They were also repetitive.
“Were biographies collected and were children photographed before their execution?” “When you were within the S-21 compound, did you hear the cries of the victims?” “During your patrols, did you see the victims with their feet shackled to bars in their cells?” “Were all the prisoners, except for women, in S-21 stripped to the waist and wearing only shorts?” “When you remained outside the door of interrogation rooms, did you hear repeatedly the cries, screams and sobbing of the prisoners being interrogated?” The facts that these questions sought to demonstrate have already been established during the trial, and one wondered that lawyers still kept coming back to these points again and again.
An interrogation that turns to the absurd
Silke Studzinsky, for civil party group 2, chose to return to the case of one of her clients, Mr. Bou Meng, who was heard at the stand on July 1st and was present in the room. She interrogated Him Huy about Bou Meng’s wife, seeking to find out what happened to her. “It was not possible for me to know precisely who was the husband or wife of whom, because after being interrogated, the person was taken for execution. I only know that the detainees’ wives were sent to be executed at Choeung Ek.” The German lawyer then told him the name of Bou Meng’s wife, thinking he would remember it… “Now that you know her name, can you answer my question?” “I was not the only person in charge of the transfer of detainees to Choeung Ek,” Him Huy answered. “[…] How could I know whether Bou Meng’s wife was transported under my shift?” The lawyer did not let go and added that the civil party had been waiting for an answer for many years.
Then, the witness denied beating Bou Meng, as the latter had indicated. This started to annoy the lawyer, who became increasingly aggressive with him. “I did not have the right to interrogate detainees. So, I was not in a position that would have led me to torture detainees,” Him Huy defended himself as he was taken for the accused and received no help from his lawyer. Silke Studzinsky then reminded him of what he said during the reconstruction at Tuol Sleng in February 2008, when he admitted he had done so. “It was not my mission to interrogate and torture detainees,” the witness repeated, running out of arguments before the lawyer’s tenacity. “Then, why did you tell the opposite to the co-Investigating Judges?” “I already told you that I never interrogated or tortured prisoners. I did not have the knowledge required to lead interrogations. How could I torture detainees? Besides, I could neither read or write.” “One does not need to know how to read and write to know how to torture,” Silke Studzinsky retorted coldly, forgetting there were precise trainings on interrogation and torture methods at S-21. She asked again why he “lied”. This went round and round for long minutes. The only thing the witness conceded was that the S-21 staff had made fun of Bou Meng’s short height, wondering how he managed to find a wife. They then tested his strength. Him Huy had to be carried on his shoulders and as he passed the test, Bou Meng proved them he was strong.
The “very strict rules”
When, another lawyer asked him later to explain the “very strict rules” in force at S-21, decreed by Duch, which he mentioned, Him Huy recited by heart a few sentences that seemed to be carved in his memory for the rest of his life: “We, the children of the Angkar, we, the children of the party, are not the children of our parents. And when we do our work, we must respect the Angkar. In everything we do, whether we are working, standing, sitting or sleeping, anyone who does not respect the rule is considered as an enemy and must be imprisoned.” He concluded that in the end, “we were a little like horses with blinkers. We could only look straight away and we could not stray away.”
A former Khmer rouge who reverts the roles
“What do you expect from your testimony before the court?”, he was then asked. “It is a way for us to be born again, for us who have survived. We are a few who were so lucky and we wish today to see justice be given,” the former Khmer Rouge answered, unruffled, as he openly posed as a victim.
The accused opportunistic?
The accused spoke before his lawyers. “If [Him Huy] had testified only about the true extent of his activities, I could have concluded that most of the truth was told. There were inadequacies, but they were minor. As a squad cadre with a rank, he shared all the relevant responsibilities with the leader. He was in charge of the arrival of the prisoners arrested, and he had to take care of it… Another of his functions was to receive the detainees outside and within S-21. He said so very clearly and I confirm it: he was in charge of transporting the detainees to Choeung Ek. […] However, there are inadequacies when he says that Pang was arrested and I was there, while I never gave Huy direct verbal orders. All the orders I gave, I gave them to Hor who, in some cases, passed them on to Huy. […] I do not wish to contest the testimony presented. In any case, Huy knows very well who was the ultimate boss at S-21. It was Son Sen. During the conference, there was nothing on the agenda that would have allowed Him Huy to speak to request his transfer to the army. […] But there was something he should not have said regarding the incomprehension between comrade Hor and myself [that is, according to Him Huy, the former favoured members of division 703 and the latter those originating from the Western zone]. He heard about it but he did not witness it. This was part of the inadequacies of his testimony, which is mostly correct.”
Duch proved fair play with his former subordinate who did not hesitate to incriminate him when he had a chance. Then, against all expectation, he returned to the case of Professor Phung Ton, who disappeared at S-21 – and whose widow and daughter joined the trial as civil parties and attend the hearings daily – and became the case in the case in this trial. “I would like to ask Him Huy a favour, because there was a professor of mine among the detainees – I did not know he had been sent to S-21. You are the one who knows what happened to him. I would like to ask you to tell the court and his family where he was taken to be executed. Was he executed at S-21 or Choeung Ek? Please, tell us the truth.” Was Duch seeking to get the sympathy of the professor’s relatives or to obtain an answer to a question that now haunted him and he dreaded to be asked later?
Kambol (Phnom Penh, Cambodia). 20/07/2009: Duch smiles while his lawyer, François Roux, interrogates Him Huy
©Stéphanie Gée
Kar Savuth dashes civil party testimonies
It was the turn of his Cambodian lawyer to question Him Huy. He got the witness to say that he had actually not received direct orders from Duch’s lips, but through intermediaries, whether it was his messenger or his deputy Hor. He took the opportunity to have him confirm that at Choeung Ek, detainees were buried immediately after being executed. The lawyer commented, in an obvious reference to the story of a recently-heard civil party who presented himself as a Choeung Ek survivor: “I was afraid one might say that people could escape from the grave pit because it was not closed.” With the same goal, he had the witness confirm the S-21 medical staff comprised of men only, thereby discrediting the testimony of another civil party, a woman who claimed she belonged to that unit. A little later: “When there were arrests, Duch was never present. Is that correct?” Him Huy cannot deny but recalled they were ordered by Duch.
Him Huy, a role in the chain of command
François Roux, Duch’s international co-lawyer, chose to return to the minutes of the reconstruction of February 26th 2008, in which the co-Investigating Judges noted that witness Him Huy “varied in his statements regarding the number of Duch’s visits” to Choeung Ek: “from time to time,” “once or twice,” or “once with Hor.” Him Huy then claimed he saw Duch go to Choeung Ek “twice,” maintaining what he stated in court on Thursday July 16th in response to judge Lavergne’s questions.
The French lawyer returned to the “special” unit which Him Huy belonged to and became the deputy chief of. “Were you an authoritarian chief?” “Myself and my group, we were not authoritarian. We only did the work we were asked to do. We did not oppose it, otherwise we would have been killed.” “You were a military, which means you received orders from your superiors but also that you gave orders to your subordinates. Is that correct?” “I myself did not give orders to the people in my group. It was Hor…” “So, you are telling the Chamber that you were a group leader but you did not give them orders. Is that right?” “Regarding the operational procedure for the arrests, I did not give orders personally because we were under Hor’s supervision…” “In military matters, for the little I know of it, Hor gave you orders and you gave orders yourself, didn’t you…?” The witness kept resisting saying what the lawyer wanted to hear. “When you were at Choeung Ek and you participated to the executions with your group, you were the one to give orders to your men for the executions. Yes or no?”, François Roux insisted. The witness did not yield and repeated that it all happened “under the very clear order of Duch” and that the executions were carried out by a different group. The accused took delight in the awkwardness of the witness, who became at a loss as to how to escape the lawyer, and did not miss one word of it. Him Huy, who kept talking with his eyes lowered, did not direct one look at the defence.
François Roux acting as a lawyer for civil party Bou Meng
The French lawyer changed topic. This time, he asked the witness to recount again the scene when he climbed on Bou Meng’s shoulders. “At that moment, I did not know it was a type of torture I performed on him. It was rather a game… I had no intention to hurt him then…” “And you found it amusing to climb on Mr. Bou Meng’s back?” “Among ourselves, we wondered if he was strong enough and to check, I jumped on his back and saw he could carry me. My intention was to test his strength, that’s all.” “And do you think he found it funny?”, François Roux continued. “He said he was strong and he could carry me. And he did it. But it was a joke. I did not threaten him.” “For you, it was a joke. For him, a little less so, I imagine.” “I think I have said enough,” Him Huy said eventually.
Above Duch, Son Sen...
“Mr. Him Huy, you presented yourself this morning as a victim looking for justice and I am willing to concur with you that you had not chosen initially the situation in which you ended up. But am I right to say that this criminal system you participated in was able to function because at each level, there were chiefs, small or big, who received, executed and gave criminal orders?” The witness: “I can say that each and everyone had to execute the orders, otherwise they would have been killed.” Then, François Roux asked Him Huy to say who was above Duch. The witness bowed: “Son Sen and I don’t know who else.” Then, Him Huy said: “We were all the victims of this system.”
A grey area in Him Huy’s late Khmer Rouge career
Turning to the accused, judge Lavergne asked him if he could confirm that “the witness was forced to quit the S-21 staff and ended up in Prey Sar.” If that was the case, who decided his transfer and why? Duch reported he had “seen Him Huy work with us until January 7th [1979].” “Neither Hor or myself sent this witness to the rice field or Prey Sar.” “So, he is not quite telling the truth, according to you,” when he claimed he was sent to the rice field in 1978, the judge continued. “He was a cadre trusted by those in charge at S-21. His testimony on this issue is not necessarily convincing. Indeed, there is no evidence,” the accused answered.
The judge then invited Him Huy to react to Duch’s words that he continued fulfilling the functions of deputy chief of the special unit at S-21 until January 7th. The witness firmly reaffirmed that in mid-1978, he was “taken out of S-21 with other guards to go and work at the rice field and build dykes.” For the fist time since he started testifying, his hands came out from under the table, where he had kept them hidden until then. One could feel him boiling, prickled – at least, that was the impression betrayed by his sudden gesture. The judge sought to know if the “rice field” corresponded to Prey Sar and if it was “re-education.” Him Huy explained he was then told a comrade had accused him in his confessions. He assured he had not been arrested but sent “there” by Hor. Doubt remained over this reassignment which, if Him Huy spoke truthfully, would mean it was possible, in a system described as locked since the start of the trial, to leave one’s functions at S-21 to be posted elsewhere, at a time when purges were in full swing and S-21 therefore required more staff as it was itself the victim of these purges.
Wake-up for the office of the co-Prosecutors
The international co-Prosecutor then intervened so that the accused be asked four questions: was there a dissension between Hor and Duch? Was Duch taking care of an investigation on Hor by the end of the existence of S-21? Did Duch kill Hor? And if he didn’t, who did? François Roux observed that William Smith should have asked these questions in the morning, when he had the floor. The president agreed with him and thanked, twice, the witness.
The trial will continue in camera to examine a request of the co-Prosecutors on whether it is possible or not to talk about joint criminal enterprise in the public hearing.
(Translated from French by Ji-Sook Lee)
