Photo: Khieu Samphan during a visit to China in April 1976.
Khmer Rouge leader arrested by Cambodian genocide court
Read Khieu Samphan's interview here.
PHNOM PENH (AFP) — Khmer Rouge leader Khieu Samphan was arrested Monday by Cambodia's UN-backed genocide tribunal, becoming the latest member of the former regime to face justice.
The 76-year-old, who acted as the country's head of state, was interviewed by tribunal judges later in the day, although no charges have been announced.
"He has been arrested and brought to the tribunal," spokesman Reach Sambath told AFP.
"The court is fulfilling its duties smoothly," he said, adding that famed French lawyer Jacques Verges would defend the Paris-educated radical whom he befriended at university in the 1950s.
Khieu Samphan was earlier Monday taken by about 30 armed security forces from a hospital in the capital Phnom Penh where had he been undergoing treatment since last week.
Witnesses said he was able to walk on his own to a waiting vehicle, but had to be lifted into his seat before being driven away in a police convoy.
Khieu Samphan is the last of five top regime cadres currently under investigation by the tribunal to be detained.
Last week two former Khmer Rouge ministers, Ieng Sary and his wife, Ieng Thirith, were arrested by the court and charged with war crimes and crimes against humanity for their alleged role in Cambodia's 1970s genocide.
Regime ideologue Nuon Chea and prison chief Duch were arrested earlier this year and also charged with crimes against humanity.
All have been widely implicated in atrocities committed by the Khmer Rouge, including "murder, extermination, imprisonment, enslavement and forced labour," according to court records.
But Khieu Samphan has denied the regime's murder policies in a new book published just days before his arrest.
"Reflection on Cambodian History from Ancient Times to the Era of Democratic Kampuchea" defends both the regime, and its leader Pol Pot as a patriot.
While acknowledging that deaths did occur, Khieu Samphan said deliberate mass killings never took place.
"There was no policy of starving the people. There was no policy of mass killings," he wrote.
"The regime always thought about the people's well-being."
Genocide researchers admit that there is not as much evidence against Khieu Samphan as against other regime leaders, but say he was aware of the Khmer Rouge's execution policies and did nothing to stop them.
However, lawyer Verges, who gained fame by defending some of the world's most notorious figures, including Nazi war criminal Klaus Barbie and the terrorist "Carlos the Jackal," claims his client was not one of the regime's policy-makers.
"The Khmer Rouge leadership did not resort to persuasion but to coercion, and, eventually, crimes against human beings. Khieu Samphan never took a direct part in these crimes," Verges said in the preface to Khieu Samphan's 2004 memoirs.
Up to two million people were executed or died of starvation and overwork as the communist regime emptied Cambodia's cities, exiling millions to vast collective farms in a bid to forge an agrarian utopia during its 1975-79 rule.
The Khmer Rouge also abolished money, religion and schools.
Cambodia's genocide court got underway last year following a decade of often tense negotiations between Cambodia and the United Nations.
Since then, the tribunal has been buffeted by infighting and corruption accusations, suffering further delays. Trials are not expected until mid-2008 amid fears that death could come before a court verdict for the tribunal's ageing defendants.
Khieu Samphan was hospitalised last Wednesday on the orders of Prime Minister Hun Sen, who said he feared the government would be blamed if the ailing regime leader died.
He was suffering abnormally high blood pressure, although medical tests conducted at Calmette Hospital found nothing immediately wrong, his wife, Sor Socheat said last week.
Khmer Rouge leader arrested by Cambodian genocide court
Read Khieu Samphan's interview here.
PHNOM PENH (AFP) — Khmer Rouge leader Khieu Samphan was arrested Monday by Cambodia's UN-backed genocide tribunal, becoming the latest member of the former regime to face justice.
The 76-year-old, who acted as the country's head of state, was interviewed by tribunal judges later in the day, although no charges have been announced.
"He has been arrested and brought to the tribunal," spokesman Reach Sambath told AFP.
"The court is fulfilling its duties smoothly," he said, adding that famed French lawyer Jacques Verges would defend the Paris-educated radical whom he befriended at university in the 1950s.
Khieu Samphan was earlier Monday taken by about 30 armed security forces from a hospital in the capital Phnom Penh where had he been undergoing treatment since last week.
Witnesses said he was able to walk on his own to a waiting vehicle, but had to be lifted into his seat before being driven away in a police convoy.
Khieu Samphan is the last of five top regime cadres currently under investigation by the tribunal to be detained.
Last week two former Khmer Rouge ministers, Ieng Sary and his wife, Ieng Thirith, were arrested by the court and charged with war crimes and crimes against humanity for their alleged role in Cambodia's 1970s genocide.
Regime ideologue Nuon Chea and prison chief Duch were arrested earlier this year and also charged with crimes against humanity.
All have been widely implicated in atrocities committed by the Khmer Rouge, including "murder, extermination, imprisonment, enslavement and forced labour," according to court records.
But Khieu Samphan has denied the regime's murder policies in a new book published just days before his arrest.
"Reflection on Cambodian History from Ancient Times to the Era of Democratic Kampuchea" defends both the regime, and its leader Pol Pot as a patriot.
While acknowledging that deaths did occur, Khieu Samphan said deliberate mass killings never took place.
"There was no policy of starving the people. There was no policy of mass killings," he wrote.
"The regime always thought about the people's well-being."
Genocide researchers admit that there is not as much evidence against Khieu Samphan as against other regime leaders, but say he was aware of the Khmer Rouge's execution policies and did nothing to stop them.
However, lawyer Verges, who gained fame by defending some of the world's most notorious figures, including Nazi war criminal Klaus Barbie and the terrorist "Carlos the Jackal," claims his client was not one of the regime's policy-makers.
"The Khmer Rouge leadership did not resort to persuasion but to coercion, and, eventually, crimes against human beings. Khieu Samphan never took a direct part in these crimes," Verges said in the preface to Khieu Samphan's 2004 memoirs.
Up to two million people were executed or died of starvation and overwork as the communist regime emptied Cambodia's cities, exiling millions to vast collective farms in a bid to forge an agrarian utopia during its 1975-79 rule.
The Khmer Rouge also abolished money, religion and schools.
Cambodia's genocide court got underway last year following a decade of often tense negotiations between Cambodia and the United Nations.
Since then, the tribunal has been buffeted by infighting and corruption accusations, suffering further delays. Trials are not expected until mid-2008 amid fears that death could come before a court verdict for the tribunal's ageing defendants.
Khieu Samphan was hospitalised last Wednesday on the orders of Prime Minister Hun Sen, who said he feared the government would be blamed if the ailing regime leader died.
He was suffering abnormally high blood pressure, although medical tests conducted at Calmette Hospital found nothing immediately wrong, his wife, Sor Socheat said last week.
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