'Curse you to seventh circle of hell' - Khmer Rogue

'Curse you to seventh circle of hell'
Khmer Rouge 'First Lady' lashes out at UN tribunal
Feb 25 2009

PHNOM PENH: - Pol Pot's sister-in-law launched an angry tirade at Cambodia's United Nations-backed genocide tribunal yesterday, telling her accusers they would be 'cursed to the seventh circle of hell'.

Ieng Thirith, 76, the ultra-Maoist movement's social minister now charged with crimes against humanity, erupted at the prosecution's suggestion that she was aware of atrocities at the notorious Tuol Sleng prison during the Khmer Rouge rule from 1975 to 1979.

'Don't accuse me of being a murderer, otherwise you will cursed to the seventh circle of hell,' Ieng Thirith, whose sister Khieu Ponnary was married to Pol Pot. said in an 15-minute outburst. 'I don't know why a good person is accused of such crimes and I have suffered a great deal and I cannot really be patient because I have been wrongly accused.'

She said she only oversaw teams rebuilding hospitals destroyed by the years of civil war that preceded the fall of Phnom Penh in 1975.

The tribunal was created in 2006 to try leading members of the Khmer Rouge regime, which wiped out up to two million people through starvation, overwork and execution in a bid to forge a communist utopia. Its first trial started last week when the regime's torturer- in-chief Kaing Guek Eav, 66, also known as Duch, went before the court.

Duch's trial will resume on March 30, the court said yesterday, with at least 40 witnesses expected to testify against the former chief of Phnom Penh's S-21 prison, where an estimated 14,000 people were tortured and killed.

Ieng Thirith, speaking a mixture of English and Khmer, said 'everything was done by Nuon Chea', the regime's top ideologue who is among the five top cadres facing trial at the tribunal over the regime's atrocities.

However, the health of the ageing suspects is a concern. Ieng Thirith's husband, former Khmer Rouge foreign minister Ieng Sary, was hospitalised on Monday for blood in his urine, court spokesman Reach Sambath said. It was the ninth time Ieng Sary, 83, has been rushed to hospital since the couple were detained by the court in November 2007.

Pol Pot, the leader of the regime, himself died in 1998.

In documents read to the court yesterday, investigating judges argued it was necessary to keep Ieng Thirith in jail to protect her security, preserve public order and ensure she did not flee from trial.

But defence lawyer Phat Pouv Seang demanded her immediate release, saying there was inadequate evidence.

The court will announce at a later date whether judges will release Ieng Thirith from detention before her trial.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE, REUTERS

Tsunami museum opens to commemorate 230,000 dead

Tsunami museum opens to commemorate 230,000 dead

BANDA ACEH: - Indonesia has opened a US$5.6 million (S$8.5 million) museum to commemorate the 230,000 people who died in the 2004 Asian tsunami.
The four-storey building in hardest-hit Aceh province exhibits photographs of victims, stories of survivors and an electronic simulation of the massive undersea earthquake that triggered the 10m-high waves.

It was designed by local architect Ridwan Kamil.

The museum also describes the tremendous outpouring of support from governments, companies and individuals in the aftermath of the Dec 26, 2004 disaster, which caused death and destruction in a dozen nations.

More than US$13 billion was pledged to house and feed survivors and to rebuild devastated coasts.

The government says the museum is an important part of the recovery process, paying tribute to those who died and explaining to future generations what happened and why.

The opening of the museum on Monday was not without controversy.

More than 700 families are still living in barracks in Aceh, which was home to two-thirds of the victims. Some were disappointed to see millions of dollars being spent on a monument.

'They should be taking care of us first,' said Madam Anisah Tahir, 50, who has been living with her husband and two children in a tiny room in a squalid camp in Banda Aceh.

'We need a decent place to live and sleep,' she said.

Indonesia is located in the so-called Pacific 'Ring of Fire', an arc of volcanoes and fault lines encircling the Pacific Basin. It is one of the world's most earthquake-prone regions.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

Freed terror detainees fit well in society

Freed terror detainees fit well in society
Rehabilitation efforts effective; none has slipped back into bad old ways
By Goh Chin Lian

23 Feb 2009

TWO-THIRDS of Singapore's terrorist detainees arrested since 2001 have been released after rehabilitation, and so far, none has strayed back into terrorism.

Close to 40 men with past terror links have been released and have returned to society, some for four years or more.

Another 20 remain in detention.

Those who have been released have re-integrated well into society, Law Minister and Second Minister for Home Affairs K. Shanmugam said yesterday at the first international conference on terrorist rehabilitation to be held here.

Addressing 200 participants from 20 countries, Mr Shanmugam said the conference is 'timely'. Rehabilitation is a critical part of counter-terrorism but has not received the necessary attention internationally, he added.

During the three-day conference, much of which is closed-door, government officials and experts will share case studies from such countries as Iraq, Egypt, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Uzbekistan and Indonesia.

Officials from Thailand, the Philippines, Pakistan and Bangladesh will also talk about rehabilitation programmes that they hope to put in place and the challenges they are facing.

The event is organised by the International Centre for Political Violence and Terrorism Research of the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, and a group of volunteer Islamic teachers and scholars who make up the Religious Rehabilitation Group.

One major challenge to current rehabilitation efforts is the lack of a foolproof way to assess whether a terrorist has been truly reformed, Mr Shanmugam said.

That is why in Singapore, released detainees must continue to attend a rehabilitation programme that aims to inoculate them against radical ideas.

The authorities here do not ever declare success but know they 'will always have to remain alert', he added.

Singapore's track record compares well against that of other countries. About one in 10 of those released from the United States' detention facility in Guantanamo Bay is either known or suspected to have returned to terrorist activity.

Saudi Arabia has re-arrested slightly over 1 per cent of its released former detainees for security offences.

While explaining that Singapore takes a holistic approach that incorporates psychological and religious aspects in rehabilitation, Mr Shanmugam also stressed that there can be no one-size-fits-all solution which will be effective across the globe.

'Every country has its unique security, cultural and social context, and the factors which lead people to and away from terrorism also differ from one country to the next,' he said.

Conference speaker Douglas Stone said a key lesson from Iraq was that physical detention alone could lead to greater radicalisation if the underlying motivations for terrorism were not addressed.

A former deputy commanding general of the multinational force in Iraq, Dr Stone was in charge of detainees there from April 2007 to June 2008.

Psychologist Michele Gelfand, of the University of Maryland in the US, said researchers are working on an index to measure the extent of a detainee's deradicalisation, by studying such factors as his approval of violence and perception of justice towards Muslims.

Professor Rohan Gunaratna, who heads the terrorism research centre here, praised Singapore's rehabilitation programme as the most systematic in the world.

'They take a very long-range view, and invested significant intellectual and other resources to study the best practices,' he said.

Mr Shanmugam also launched a web portal, www.P4Peace.com, developed by the research centre to provide a one-stop source of information on counter-terrorism.

It also aims to promote discussion on peaceful alternatives to terror, and thereby spark a counter-movement to the spread of terrorist ideas online.

chinlian@sph.com.sg