CAMBODIA:Judges investigating the Khmer Rouge genocide last night charged the first suspect with crimes against humanity for his alleged part in the deaths of 1.7 million Cambodians in the Killing Fields.
Kaing Guek Eav (64), known as Duch, is to be detained by the UN-backed tribunal and may be the first in the dock when the long-stalled process begins next year.
The infamous Duch was the Khmer Rouge government's chief interrogator and ran the notorious Tuol Sleng S-21 prison, where 14,000 inmates died of torture, disease and execution in the 1970s. Only seven of those who entered the former school compound emerged alive.
Yesterday Duch was taken from the military detention centre where he was held for eight years to the war crimes tribunal's headquarters on the outskirts of the capital, Phnom Penh.
The prosecutors submitted charges against five of Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot's henchmen to the judges two weeks ago. Duch's file was among them, although so far he is the only person named.
It is widely thought that Noun Chea, the communist movement's chief ideologue known as "Brother No 2"; Ieng Sary, the former foreign minister; Khieu Samphan, the nominal head of state; and Meas Muth, Pol Pot's son-in-law, are among the other suspects. All four live freely in Cambodia.
Pol Pot, "Brother No 1", died in 1998 at Along Veng, the Khmer Rouge's last jungle stronghold, while the movement's one-legged military chief, Ta Mok, died last year, almost three decades after being ousted by Vietnamese troops in 1979.
The speed with which the judges have moved took some observers by surprise, despite a decade of wrangling over the tribunal's ground rules that threatened to derail the process, much to the distress of Cambodians awaiting answers.
The tribunal will adhere to the Cambodian justice system, with input from UN-appointed international judges and lawyers.
Duch has been detained since his arrest in May 1999. Yesterday he was questioned by the tribunal's senior Cambodian and French investigating judges.
A Cambodian and international defence lawyer were present throughout his interrogation.
His Cambodian lawyer, Kar Savuth, said Duch - a mathematics teacher before joining the revolutionary cause in the 1960s - had no powers to arrest or kill anyone and was only following "verbal orders from the top".
However, during his time in detention he has admitted multiple atrocities committed during the Khmer Rouge's disastrous four-year rule that saw a quarter of the population killed in an effort to establish a peasant utopia free of intellectuals.
Duch is expected to be a key witness against other Khmer Rouge leaders.
Chum Mey, one of the few Tuol Sleng prison survivors, said he was delighted to hear Duch had been brought before the tribunal, turning the tables on the former interrogator responsible for the torture of thousands forced to confess to crimes, most often to being CIA spies.
"I want to confront him to ask who gave him the orders to kill the Cambodian people," said Chum Mey (77).
"I want to hear how he will answer before the court, or if he will just blame everything on the ghosts of Pol Pot and Ta Mok."
The first trials are not expected to begin until next year, more than 18 months into the €41 million tribunal's three-year mandate.