Political pressure

The Khmer Rouge tribunal is a hybrid court with Cambodian and international staff holding equal positions throughout the court’s structure.

That parallel structure also holds true in the investigations department, where German national Siegfried Blunk is the international co-investigating judge. His Cambodian counterpart is called You Bunleng.

Three weeks ago, the two investigating judges concluded their examination into the court’s third case and handed the file back to the prosecution.

For months, the court had bubbled with rumors that the investigating judges had done very little work on Case Three during their 20-month investigation.

The international prosecutor, Andrew Cayley, implied as much last week when he told Deutsche Welle that the case file needed a "significant amount" of work still.

Only two cases against five former Khmer Rouge

Phnom Penh has long said it will allow only two cases against a total of five former Khmer Rouge.

One of the cases concluded last year and saw the regime's former security chief Comrade Duch convicted of war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The other, scheduled to start later this year, will see the four surviving senior leaders tried for genocide and a raft of other crimes.

Cases Three and Four - involving another five Khmer Rouge - were set to be the tribunal's last, but it now looks increasingly clear they will not go ahead, much to the Cambodian government's satisfaction.

A series of unanswered questions

Some observers believe that in carrying out a shoddy investigation, Blunk's office has buckled to political pressure.

Questions have also been asked of the United Nations' role in all this. After all, Siegfried Blunk, who started work six months ago after his predecessor quit, is a UN employee.

The UN Secretary-General's office in New York has so far dodged questions about Blunk and his investigation into Case Three.

When I emailed Blunk to ask whether the court was trying to bury Cases Three and Four, he replied with a threat, saying the question was "insolent." He gave me two days to apologize. He has not received an apology and has ignored further emailed questions.

Possible contempt of court charges

It gets stranger still. In the past week, well-placed court sources said Blunk was considering filing contempt of court charges against the international prosecutor Andrew Cayley.

That came after Cayley issued a statement containing enough information about Case Three to allow anyone affected by its crimes to apply to the court for civil party status.

He also called on Blunk's office to undertake such basic steps as interviewing the suspects in Case Three and examining the crime sites.

On Wednesday, Blunk ordered Cayley to retract that statement on the grounds that the investigating judges considered the information confidential.

Clair Duffy, a trial monitor with the Soros-funded Open Society Justice Initiative, said that news that Blunk was considering legal action against Cayley could do the court serious damage.

"The international co-prosecutor's acted independently and carried out his legal duty in identifying major gaps in the Case Three investigation, and in seeking further investigative acts," she said.

Until the United Nations and Blunk answer to the public, it will remain unclear just what is going on but Cases Three and Four will almost certainly not make it to trial.

Author: Robert Carmichael
Editor: Anne Thomas