The Communist jail warden responsible for the deaths of
more than 15,000 Cambodians — part of the Khmer
Rouge genocide of approximately 1.7
million people — is guilty. He might be incarcerated 19 more
years; less if he behaves well, as is expected.
Appropriate punishment against Kaing Guek Eav, known as the
Tuol Sleng prison’s Comrade Duch (pronounced Doik), had little
chance of implementation and was never going to fit the crimes
(especially since the Southeast Asian nation has no death
penalty). “Even if we chop him up into two million
pieces it will not bring our family members
back,”
said Huy Vannak, a
television news director.
But even with those low expectations, the sentence
was a
shock to many. “It comes down to serving
11 ½ hours per life that he took, which is just not
comprehensible or acceptable,”
said Theary Sang, who lost both her
parents during the Khmer Rouge reign of terror in the late 1970s.
Few Cambodians, even today, live without the knowledge (or vivid
memories) that parents, grandparents, siblings, aunts and uncles
were brutally killed or starved to death during Pol Pot’s
reign.
Duch received a 35-year sentence, but was credited with the
11 years he’s already served. He also was granted a five-year
term reduction because the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts
of Cambodia found he was illegally detained before the creation
of the war crimes tribunal. According to
news reports,
judges were also lenient because of
contrition he expressed, for accepting responsibility for his
crimes, and for cooperation he provided in cases against
high-level Khmer Rouge officials that are expected to go to trial
next year. They also apparently considered that Duch was part of
a criminal system in which disloyalty on his part would have cost
him is own life — in other words, he was “following
orders.”
But accounts of Duch’s life even before Pol Pot’s rise show
he was a dedicated believer in the cause and was willing to
inflict unimaginable evils upon fellow countrymen for their
dissent, whether real or imagined. Quoting French scholar and
former Communist Party of Kampuchea (Cambodia) captive Francois
Bizot, Yale University historian Ben Kiernan noted:
In his few months’ captivity, Bizot “discovered that Duch
believed all Cambodians of differing viewpoints to be traitors
and liars, and that he personally beat prisoners who would not
tell the ‘truth,’ a matter which drove him into a rage….” A CPK
defector who met Duch in either 1972 or 1973 recalled him as
“ill-tempered, impatient and doctrinaire.”
The paranoia carried over to Duch’s oversight of Tuol
Sleng, also known as S-21, the secret Phnom Penh prison where
guards administered extreme torture and extracted phony
confessions from captives. He described repeatedly during the
trial how he was responsible for death and duress, and that no
one escaped or was released. Most accounts say that only seven
people survived S-21. “The children were separated from their
mothers and those children were smashed,” Duch said. “Because
they needed the mothers to be separated so they could be
interrogated, those children were smashed.”
It was worse — if you can believe it — as Nic Dunlop
explained in his extraordinary book about Duch,
The Lost Executioner. The
convicted jailer’s expectations were well understood and obeyed,
as Dunlop discovered in an interview with Ham In, who in 1972 was
captive at Duch’s first prison in Amleang, called M-13:
[Ham] never saw Duch give any orders. The guards knew exactly
what to do. The prison was well organized and the guards
disciplined. Many of them were children of twelve or thirteen,
some as young as seven. They were considered more trustworthy
than their elders, unpolluted by the old ways. These children
had been forcibly separated from their parents and the
Organization became their only family. They became fanatical,
blind leaders of the revolution, following every order to the
letter, no matter how absurd or brutal.
So the stated reasons for leniency by the court were
invalid. Duch was as dedicated to the Communist agrarian utopia
ideal as any Khmer Rouge. He admitted culpability
repeatedly in court and said
he deserved severe punishment.
And
he called into question the
sincerity of his remorse by demanding his immediate release on
the last day of his trial in November.
But we’re talking about a
corrupt Cambodian criminal justice system
that was
not enhanced by the backing and
involvement of the U.N. Also, many former Khmer Rouge (including
Prime Minister Hun Sen) serve in the Cambodian government
presently. So far only Duch has been tried, while top Pol Pot
lieutenants Khieu Samphan, Nuon Chea, Ieng Sary and Ieng Sirith
— all age 78 or older — await indictments maybe
at the end of this year. Only recently have they all been
arrested and jailed. Even if they survive until trial, which
could last years, how serious could the justice be?
Most news articles note Duch’s born-again Christianity,
with some suggesting that was part of the reason for
an eased sentence. In a largely Buddhist country I doubt that’s
the case, but if so, that’s unfortunate. Duch may be welcomed
into Heaven because he put his faith in Jesus Christ for the
remission of his sins, but that should have no bearing on justice
here.
What should be taken from this chapter of evil that will
never be requited? Focus on those who God preserved, through
miracles and their own resilience. The amazing story of Cam Youk
Lim, who saved herself and five children by escaping to the
United States via Vietnam and France, is a great place to start.
Her son and my friend, Sophal Ear,
tells the story. There are
many
others.
