• The regime
The communist Khmer Rouge seized control of Cambodia in April 1975 and immediately began dismantling modern society in their drive to transform the country into an agrarian utopia.
Up to two million people died of starvation, overwork, torture or execution under the regime, which abolished religion, schools and currency.
The Khmer Rouge were driven from power in 1979 by Vietnamese troops and former regime members who defected, including Hun Sen, now Cambodia’s Prime Minister.
He was a mid-level military commander until fleeing to Vietnam in 1977. Under him, the Cambodian government fought the Khmer Rouge until the movement collapsed in the late 1990s.
• The tribunal
Cambodia and the United Nations signed an agreement in 2003 to establish the tribunal. Known as the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC), it is a complex hybrid court combining elements of international and domestic law.
Its mandate is to prosecute senior leaders and “those most responsible” for the crimes committed between 1975 and 1979. The court can impose a sentence of up to life in prison. There is no death penalty and no financial compensation for victims.
The perennially cash-strapped tribunal has cost nearly $150 million so far and is funded almost entirely by foreign nations.
It was widely praised for its first trial but it has been dogged by allegations of political interference.
• Those on trial
The court’s second case involves Brother Number Two Nuon Chea, former head of state Khieu Samphan, and ex-foreign minister Ieng Sary.
They face charges of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Ieng Sary’s wife Ieng Thirith, the regime’s former social affairs minister, faces the same charges but judges ruled in November that she was unfit to stand trial because she has dementia. She remains in detention while undergoing treatment.
Former Khmer Rouge prison chief Kaing Guek Eav, better known as Duch, was handed a life term on appeal yesterday, increasing the original 30-year sentence he received in 2010 for war crimes and crimes against humanity.
• Those who escaped justice
“Brother Number One” Pol Pot died in 1998 at the age of 73 while under house arrest by Khmer Rouge rebels who had turned against him.
Ta Mok, a feared military commander nicknamed “The Butcher” for the massacres and purges he ordered, was arrested in 1999. He was awaiting trial by the war crimes court but died in 2006 at the age of 80.
Because of the tribunal’s limited scope, thousands of lower-level Khmer Rouge members and fighters who carried out the regime’s brutal acts will also never face the court.