Cambodia: Justice Deferred . . . Yet Again

While most of the world has been looking the other way, formal proceedings finally began against surviving leaders complicitous in the killing of an estimated 1.7 million Cambodians by the brutal Khmer Rouge regime.

Although the first United Nations-sponsored trial was not expected to begin until next year, a special prosecutor's office opened in Phnom Penh last year and the task of sorting through hundreds of thousands of pages of evidence has been underway.

The investigation is in a race against mortality. Pol Pot, the Khmer Rouge leader, died in 1998, while Ta Mok, the Khmer military commander, packed in last year.

But now foreign judges and locals are at loggerheads over procedural differences.

The judges want full international legal standards, while the Cambodians say local law must take precedence.

More here.

Hat tip to The Reaction