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Khmer torturer Kaing Guek Eav shocked by horror
Agence France Presse - June 24, 2009
Phnom Penh – The Khmer Rouge prison chief says he was "shocked" when confronted with his bloody past and has prayed annually for forgiveness.
Kaing Guek Eav, 66, better known as Duch, is on trial at a UN-backed war crimes court in Cambodia for overseeing the torture and extermination of 15,000 people who passed through the hardline communist movement's notorious Tuol Sleng prison, also known as S-21.
"When I arrived at S-21, I was shocked for the numerous things that happened there. I saw the victims or the survivors – three of them – who stood before me. What happened in the past came back into my mind," Duch told the court yesterday.
He was describing his visit with investigators last year to the former prison, now a genocide museum, so he could re-enact his crimes.
Duch's defence team showed a short video of the visit, in which he attempts to speak but sobs uncontrollably, removes his glasses and is comforted by his lawyer. "I made a speech for the souls of those who died. This is something that I can never forget, the trip to Choeung Ek (the so-called killing field where prisoners were killed) and S-21 in Phnom Penh," Duch said.
He told the court he became consumed with sorrow after fleeing the prison in the face of Vietnam's 1979 invasion of Cambodia, and began to make an annual prayer offering.
"I asked forgiveness to my parents, then I asked forgiveness from all my teachers, then I asked forgiveness to the victims of all the crimes," he said.
He asked judges for permission to make a statement to the daughter of one of Tuol Sleng's victims, who was in court.
Trial chamber president Nil Nonn denied the request, telling him he would be allowed to use testimony to speak to victims near the end of proceedings.
Duch denies he had a central role in the Khmer Rouge's iron-fisted rule. He maintains he tortured only two people himself and never personally executed anyone.
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