Ex-Khmer Rouge leader’s life sentence upheld

By Riyaz ul Khaliq

ISTANBUL (AA) - A UN-backed court in Cambodia on Thursday upheld the life imprisonment of former Khmer Rouge regime leader Khieu Samphan.

The Supreme Court Chamber of the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia ruled that the “life sentence was just, based on the atrocities suffered by people during the Khmer Rouge’s reign of terror.”

“It declared that the decision is final and cannot be appealed further,” daily Phnom Penh Post reported.

The only surviving member of the radical Communist regime, Samphan, 91, along with former chief ideologue Nuon Chea, was convicted in 2018 for committing genocide during the ultra-communist regime’s rule from 1975 to 1979.

Thursday’s decision also marked an end of the judicial process launched in 2006 to bring to justice perpetrators of the reign of terror as no one else is being tried.

The duo was found guilty of genocide against the Cham and Vietnamese ethnic groups.

They were sentenced to life behind bars in 2014.

In another verdict, they had been found criminally responsible for the evacuation of Phnom Penh on April 17, 1975, a second forced movement of people, and the execution of Lon Nol soldiers and officials at a remote, rural site.

The Khmer Rouge swept to power in April 1975, overthrowing the US-backed Lon Nol regime and instituting a series of brutal policies to turn the country into an agrarian regime.

This came at the expense of at least 1.5 million lives, which were lost through work, torture, or execution.