Word: khmers
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...sent to study in Paris in the 1950s where they met and later married two other Cambodian students - creating a foursome that went on to form the nucleus of one of the world's most brutal regimes. The elder Khieu sister, Ponnary, married Pol Pot, leader of the fanatical Khmer Rouge movement which fought its way to bloody victory in Cambodia in 1975 and then established a regime under which an estimated 1.7 million people died by 1979. Her younger sister, Thirith, wedded Pol Pot's confidant and Khmer Rouge foreign minister, Ieng Sary; she also served as the regime...
...Ieng Sary has regularly denied any knowledge of the regime's policies of extermination. Ieng Thirith has been even more vocal: several years ago, she made a withering written attack on Youk Chhang, Cambodia's foremost genocide researcher, claiming his years of research into the alleged crimes of Khmer Rouge regime had found not a shred of incriminating evidence and that his work was nothing "but lies and defamation...
...Youk Chhang, for his part, says Ieng Sary was considered one of the "untouchable" Khmer Rouge leaders. His arrest and that of his wife have sent powerful messages to the Cambodian people that the tribunal is truly working to find justice for the victims of the regime. "[Ieng Thirith] was minister of social action and education," Youk Chhang says. "She will have a lot to tell us [in court...
...Iengs' arrests are the third and fourth of five former Khmer Rouge leaders targeted by the co-prosecutors at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Court of Cambodia (ECCC) - the official name of the U.N.-backed Khmer Rouge tribunal established in Phnom Penh. Kaing Guek Eav, better known as Duch, the regime's chief jailer and torturer, was the first suspect to be detained in July. Second-in-command Nuon Chea was arrested in September. Khieu Samphan, the regime's onetime head of state, is the last surviving senior leader at large and many believe that his is the fifth name...
...Monday, neighbors came out to wish them good riddance. "They killed many people and they must be prosecuted," says Pouk Salonn, 57, the owner of a small shop near the Iengs' villa who lost her parents during the regime. But with the passage of some 30 years since the Khmer Rouge regime committed its crimes, the arrest of the elderly pair - Sary is 82 and Thirith is 75 - was little consolation. "Why are you only coming to ask questions now?" she asks, noting that there seemed to be more media attention on Pol Pot's terrifying reign now than there...