Khmer Rouge Leaders On Trial

The Associated Press reports:

The top four surviving members of the brutal Khmer Rouge went on trial Monday before a tribunal aimed at finding justice for the estimated 1.7 million people who died in Cambodia's "killing fields" of the 1970s.

With the aging leaders all in their late 70s or early 80s and with Khmer Rouge overlord Pol Pot long dead, the trial before the U.N.-backed panel represents the last, best chance for Cambodia to bring accountability to the Khmer Rouge leadership blamed for the deaths.

All four of the defendants say they are innocent.

"This is, at this time, the most important trial in the world," said Stephen Rapp, US envoy on war crimes issues. "It's a message to others who might commit similar crimes, that there will be consequences. That it may not happen tomorrow or the next day. But eventually, you'll be in the dock as well."

During their 1975-79 reign, the Khmer Rouge tried to implement a communist utopia, but ended up killing as many as one-quarter of their countrymen through executions, medical neglect, overwork and starvation.