35 years of prison time for Kaeng Kek Iev - better known as Duch - is strange. Iev, a prison chief in Cambodia's notorious torture prison S-21 during the reign of the Khmer Rouge, is responsible for the violent and untimely death of about 14000 people.
He is the first person ever to stand trial and receive verdict for his crimes during the genocide in 1975-79.
Sivarak Chutipong is a name everyone, who follows South East Asian news, will recognize. From complete anonymousity just a few months ago, Sivarak Chutipong became famous over night. Why? He is a spy.
In Cambodia, on Tuesday Oct 26, a nun was murdered. She had grabbed the wrong bowl to feed the pigs with and then an angry man beat her to death with a stick for her mistake. Same day, in an unrelated case, a young student became the center of a drunken brawl. Two men got so upset with the student that they beat him with a hammer and an iron bar.
The only thing those two incidents have in common - apart from a deadly outcome for the victim - is that the perpetrator was a Buddhist monk.
Alexandra Kent
Senior Researcher
NIAS - Nordic Institute of Asian Studies
Thirty years after the end of the brutal Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia, a ‘hybrid’ war crimes tribunal has finally begun. A mixed team of Cambodian and foreign lawyers have just kicked into motion with the trial of ‘Duch’, the first of five suspects to be tried. The others are Khmer Rouge leaders Khieu Samphan, Ieng Thirith, Ieng Sary and Nuon Chea.
Hilda Rømer Christensen,
Lektor
Sociologisk Instititut
Københavns Universitet
Cecilia Milwertz
Seniorforsker
NIAS - Nordisk Institut for Asienstudier
Kristina Jönsson,
Ph.D, Researcher,
Centre for East and South-East Asian Studies, Lund University, Sweden
