Field experience in Cambodia places Human Rights Program student at the cusp of the Khmer Rouge Tribunal
During the Summer of 2006, 2L Becky Mangold spent 10 weeks working for the Khmer Institute for Democracy (KID), an NGO founded in 1992 to foster
human rights and promote respect for the rule of law in Cambodia, working on issues related to the Khmer Rouge Tribunal project for the Cambodian
genocide. Her timing was perfect.“I think the most exciting part was that the tribunal was starting right then, the same time I was there,” said Mangold, pointing out that the tribunal started her first week there. “To be on the cusp of this is what drew me to the project, and made it a great experience.”
The Cambodian Parliament ratified legislation in 2004 to establish a UN-backed tribunal to put senior leaders of the Khmer Rouge regime on trial. It is estimated that more than one million Cambodians died under the Khmer Rouge’s 1975-1979 rule, through execution, starvation, displacement, and forced labor. The tribunal will prosecute a select number of senior leaders responsible for the atrocities during the Khmer Rouge period.
The tribunal itself is quite exceptional compared to other tribunals, said Mangold, which is one of the reasons why people should learn more about it.
“I think the Cambodian tribunal is unique, because it’s the only one that hasn’t started immediately after the conflict,” she said, referring to the Rwanda and Yugoslavia tribunals. “The tribunal is also half Cambodian, and half international, and has a focus on capacity building on the ground.”
Mangold worked under two people at KID – a director and a project director – writing legal memos on issues that the tribunal would take up once it became operational. Mangold was also on an intern team with two other students drafting a “super memo” on the legality of prolonged pre-trial detention for two suspects that were allegedly senior Khmer Rouge leaders. These two leaders were arrested seven years ago, but have not been tried yet. One of the suspects, Ta Mok, died this past summer while in custody.
“The question we were dealing with was how do you prosecute suspects for genocide, when those suspects own human rights have been violated over the course of their detention?” said Mangold. The memo concluded that the best course of action to take, if the suspects were found guilty, would be to subtract pre-detention time from their overall sentence.
Mangold also met with experts on International Criminal Tribunals who were informing NGOs on what role they could play in the Khmer Rouge tribunal, as well as judges who had participated in the Rwanda, East Timor and Yugoslavia tribunals. She also assisted in writing a training manual for police and law enforcement bodies that included standards in international law for confidentiality and interviewing.
Mangold said that it will be interesting to see how the tribunal proceeds, both in how the tribunal will define “senior leaders” and how the tribunal will handle the large expectations it faces.
“It’s a common misperception that people in Cambodia don’t want anything done,” said Mangold. “People are outraged that they never had justice…symbolically, the tribunal will be incredibly important, so that the thirty years of impunity that the perpetrators of genocide had will come to an end.”
Mangold noted, however, that people have great expectations for the tribunal, which will be a slower process than many Cambodians were anticipating.
One of the ways that Mangold’s NGO worked to explain the process of the tribunal – including its timeline – was to produce radio spots that spelled out the slow nature of the tribunal. Mangold helped write these radio spots, and also worked with a filmmaker to translate a documentary video on children who did not believe their parents when they said that genocide happened.
“One thing that really hit home – one of the most telling things – was when the filmmaker was interviewing the kids, and the kids got it that genocide had actually occurred. The filmmaker asked them if they thought anything like this could happen again. One kid said, no, this couldn’t happen again because we have international organizations here now to protect us,” said Mangold. “But another kid said, ‘Wait, wasn’t the UN already here when the genocide was taking place?’”
“The kids were asking, ‘Why did this happen?’, and at the end, why couldn’t it happen again?”
Chiefly, Becky’s experience in Cambodia was an exciting opportunity to see the many systems working with the tribunal, and how people on the ground are experiencing the tribunal process.
“The reason my experience was so good is that I got on-the-ground experience of why people want a tribunal, but also got to see the legal issues involved behind a tribunal,” said Mangold. “Being there during the formation of the tribunal, having the opportunity to sit in on initial meetings, and hearing about how the process for the tribunal would be established was a major reason why my experience was exciting, challenging, but altogether great.”