Khmer Rouge Tribunal Receiving Training in International Law
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Media contact:
Derek Ferrar
Phone: (808) 944-7204
Email: ferrard@EastWestCenter.org
HONOLULU (Feb. 4) -- The Asian International Justice Initiative (AIJI), a collaboration between the East-West Center in Hawaii and the War Crimes Studies Center at the University of California, Berkeley, has begun a week and a half of training workshops in international law for all the judges of the Khmer Rouge war-crimes tribunal in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. The workshops are focusing on legal issues likely to play a central role in the tribunal’s upcoming trials.
A seminar for all of the judges from Feb. 5-8 includes major areas of substantive and procedural law, followed by specialized workshops Feb. 11-13 for the tribunal’s Pre-Trial Chamber – which has already begun hearings in several cases – and Office of the Co-Investigating Judges.
The tribunal, the formal name of which is the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC), was formed after the Cambodian National Assembly passed a law in 2001 to create a court to try serious crimes committed during the Khmer Rouge regime of 1975-1979. The government of Cambodia insisted that, for the sake of the Cambodian people, the trial must be held in Cambodia using Cambodian staff and judges together with foreign personnel. An agreement was ultimately reached with the UN in 2003 for international judges, prosecutors and defense lawyers to participate in the tribunal alongside Cambodian jurists.
Professor David Cohen, director of the Berkeley War Crimes Studies Center and AIJI director, is chairing this week’s workshops. He is joined by a distinguished international faculty of seven individuals who have significant experience at the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and other war-crimes tribunals. Joining Cohen are ICTY Trial Chamber Judge O-Gon Kwon; ICTY Appeals Chamber Judge Liu Daqun; former ICTY Trial Chamber Judge Claude Hanoteau; Suzannah Linton, professor of international human rights law at Hong Kong University and former war-crimes prosecutor in East Timor and Kosovo; Catherine Marchi-Uhel, head of the ICTY’s Appeals Chamber; Magda Karagiannakis, Australian barrister and former trial attorney at the ICTY; and Philip Coo, Senior Investigator at the ICTY.
The AIJI has already conducted workshops for the tribunal’s prosecution and defense in the summer and fall of 2007, and further workshops are anticipated in the coming year.
Funding for the workshops comes from a grant to the East-West Center from the British embassy in Phnom Penh.
For more information on the workshops, please contact Professor David Cohen at djcohen@berkeley.edu or the East-West Center’s Phil Estermann at estermap@eastwestcenter.org.
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The Asian International Justice Initiative aims to provide on-the-ground support for rule-of-law and human-rights initiatives in Asia, in both the domestic and international legal context, primarily by partnering with courts and other institutions in the justice sector to assist them in achieving their goals in these areas.
The EAST-WEST CENTER is an education and research organization established by the U.S. Congress in 1960 to strengthen relations and understanding among the peoples and nations of Asia, the Pacific, and the United States. The Center contributes to a peaceful, prosperous and just Asia Pacific community by serving as a vigorous hub for cooperative research, education and dialogue on critical issues of common concern to the Asia Pacific region and the United States. Funding for the Center comes from the U.S. government, with additional support provided by private agencies, individuals, foundations, corporations, and the governments of the region.