Brother No. 3’s New War

Ieng Sary, Brother No. 3, is seeking release from detention by the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia for the Prosecution of Crimes Committed During the Period of Democratic Kampuchea (”ECCC“). His lawyers have appeared before the ECCC on Monday and Tuesday arguing that the former senior Khmer Rouge commander should be granted bail as he is in inclement health and that the present trial violates “double jeopardy” principles as Ieng had already been convicted of crimes against humanity in 1979.

Naturally, his lawyers conveniently omitted to mention the fact that Ieng also secured a royal pardon in 1996 thereby rendering the so called conviction pointless. Nevertheless, that in itself may be moot as the 1979 trial was conducted perfunctorily with Pol Pot and Ieng Sary both being tried in absentia, convicted and sentenced to death.

Given such a context, there is little value to the conviction obtained by the then Cambodian government. And if this is so, then there is also little value to the royal pardon that followed suit. Fortifying this notion is this further fact:

“… on the same day he signed the decree, King Sihanouk made public a letter he had sent to Amnesty International in which he said he would support the judgment of any future tribunal that tries Mr. Ieng Sary or other Khmer Rouge leaders.”

Of course, to Ieng’s lawyers the objective of bail is little more than a ruse for a more obscure objective i.e. success can also be attained by waging a war of attrition with the ECCC. When the ECCC was set up, the initial budget for it was $56 million. A few months back, news began to surface that officials needed a further financial injection of $114 million if it was to attain its objective of putting the senior Khmer Rouge leaders to trial.

Whether or not Ieng and his cohorts succeed in such a strategem is anyone’s guess. One thing is however clear. The detainees are old. If the finance doesn’t run out, time will.

And for Cambodians affected by the brutality of the regime, the death of the detainees will deliver the final blow to what little semblance of justice the ECCC offers for their sufferings during the dark days of that terrible regime.