Life sentences upheld for former Khmer Rouge leaders

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia, Nov. 23 (UPI) -- A special court in Cambodia on Tuesday upheld the two-year-old life sentences given to two of the top-ranked leaders of the Khmer Rouge regime in the late 1970s in that country.

Nuon Chea and Khieu Samphan lost appeals of life sentences for their role in Khmer Rouge's brutal four-year reign in Cambodia Tuesday in the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia.

Chea and Samphan are the first leaders of the regime to face a penalty for 1.7 million people, about one quarter of the Cambodian population at the time, dying from forced labor, starvation and execution as Khmer Rouge tried to forcefully make Cambodia an agrarian society.

While the life sentences are regarded by some in Cambodia as too soft on Chea and Samphan, known as Brother Two and Brother Four, others are also bothered by how long it took to reach a verdict and actually start their sentences.

"They have people who care for them, live with air conditioning and they are [treated] like millionaires," said Sat Tangkim, who was in a labor camp under Khmer Rouge, told the Phnom Pen Post.

Tangkim said many who should be punished died because of how long trials have taken. "We should not be easy on them. I want them to be placed in a dark cell with no light, no visitors and no care," she said.

The United Nations-backed Supreme Court Chamber of the Extraordinary Chambers in the Court of Cambodia turned down the appeals, which sought to overturn convictions for crimes against humanity, murder and persecution on political acts during the evacuation of Phnom Penh after the city fell in 1975, as well as for similar crimes between 1975 and 1977.

The court considered inconsistency of evidence and testimony by some witnesses, and the existence of a blanket policy to kill people could not be proven during the trial, the judges said.

Despite overturning some charges because of a lack of clarity in the case presented during trial, enough war crimes and crimes against humanity charges stand that they high-ranking members of the regime will most likely spend the rest of their lives behind bars.