Nuon Chea
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Nuon Chea, also known as "Brother Number Two", was Deputy General Secretary of the Communist Party and chief lieutenant to Pol Pot during the Khmer Rouge era. Although implicated by former subordinates and documents in crimes against humanity, he currently lives a free man in a modest home with his wife near the Thailand border. On December 29, 1998, following a bargain with the government Chea surrendered as part of the last remnants of Khmer Rouge resistance and in a press conference after the deal expressed a terse statement of sorrow for the suffering of Cambodians, "Actually we are very sorry, not just for the lives of people, but also for the lives of animals that suffered in the war". The government under Prime Minister Hun Sen agreed to forsake attempts to prosecute Chea; a decision that was condemned by Cambodians and the international community.
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[edit] "Brother Number Two Enjoys Retirement"
The contrition in Chea's brief words of sorrow were cast in doubt by the opinion of documentary journalist, Phil Rees, who interviewed Chea for "Brother Number Two Enjoys Retirement" a BBC documentary broadcast on March 17, 2002. Rees described Chea's behavior as irreverent, "It was his laugh that got to me. A smug, self-satisfying chuckle that punctuated his answers". Chea would steadfastly deny complicity in ordering executions at a political prison at Tuol Sleng in response to Ree's assertions of specific evidence:
- Rees: A confession from a Khmer Rouge officer named Nhiem Sim included a note from his interrogator. It describes torturing a prisoner 'until he confessed that he was involved in the CIA'. It was passed to Nuon Chea.
- Nuon Chea: No, I never had such a report.
- Phil Rees: It's got written on it there 'a copy to Brother Nuon'.
- Nuon Chea: I don't know who wrote it. What? They sent a report. I don't know of this, I've never seen it. Sometimes they wrote that but I've never seen it.
- Phil Rees: Duch says that you called to meet him and you told Duch, you said; 'don't bother to interrogate them, just kill them'.
- Nuon Chea: No, I did not. I am not so cruel as to kill my people because soldiers are children of farmers, poor farmers. I am not cruel. I don't want to kill people in the army. So I never gave such an answer because I have the heart of a creator not a destroyer.
- Phil Rees: There are mass graves around Cambodia, killing fields, who is in those graves then, I mean who are the people who were killed?
- Nuon Chea: I don't know who they are because the situation was very chaotic. During the war we don't know how many were killed. During our regime, while we built up the country for three years, we didn't know. They could have been people who died of starvation but how many, we don't know.
Chea would go as far as admitting a failure of duty, "I have a moral responsibility. I'm sorry but I wasn't close enough to the work. I said I was morally sorry because I didn't examine the work closely".
[edit] War Crimes Trials
After six years of negotiations starting from 1997, the Cambodian government and the UN arranged the procedural agreement necessary for war crimes trials. Several top former Khmer Rouge leaders are in custody awaiting trial. These trials will take place late 2005 -early 2006.
[edit] Notes
- ↑ BBC News (2002). "Brother Number Two enjoys retirement" (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/correspondent/1874949.stm). Retrieved April 19, 2005.
- ↑ Rees, Paul. (2002, March 17). Brother Number Two Enjoys Retirement. Frank Smith, Correspondent. British Broadcasting Corporation.
[edit] References
- Lynch, David J. (March 21, 2005). "Cambodians hope justice will close dark chapter". USA Today, p. 14A - 15A
- Watkin, Huw (December 30, 1998). "Guerillas 'sorry' for genocide". The Australian, p. 8
