Inside the UN war crimes trial in Phnom Penh.
The United Nations-backed Khmer Rouge trial in Phnom Penh has had serious obstacles for a long time, but this week, officials say they’ve run out of money to pay hundreds of Cambodian trial workers.
None of the 300 Cambodians working in the court will get their wages from January and will possibly not get paid in February or March either. The kinds of jobs not getting paid at this point are wide-ranging from judges to drivers.
The money problem does not affect the more than 130 international workers at the war crimes court because their wages come from the United Nations. The Cambodian staff salaries are paid by donors from Japan, France, and Australia.
The three Cambodians currently on trial for Genocide and War Crimes.
All of this is compounded by the fact that a new foreign judge has been appointed and there’s a very public standoff because the judge wants to look into possible new genocide cases, but the Cambodian government is strongly opposed to that.
There have also always been allegations that the trials are proceeding too slowly. This is not good for attracting donor money to pay the local staff salaries. It’s also not good in giving us any kind of hope that justice might be served. Now we just wait it out and see if things will ever go forward.
Monks watch the trial.
To learn more about the genocide that wiped out about a fourth of Cambodia’s population between 1975 and 1979, read my past posts by clicking below:
