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	Khmer Rouge prison chief handed over to court by AFP Cambodia   July 31, 2007   A notorious Khmer Rouge prison chief today became the first suspect to be handed over to a UN-backed genocide tribunal in Cambodia.   Duch, whose real name is Kang Kek Ieu, was the only Khmer Rouge figure in custody ahead of Cambodia''s long-stalled genocide trials. He had been held in a military prison since 1999.   "The tribunal has issued a warrant asking to send (Duch) - we handed him over this morning to the tribunal," said Ngin Sam An, a military court investigating judge who has overseen Duch''s case since his arrest. "He will be kept there. He will not be sent back to military prison," he said.   Tribunal officials said that Duch was being questioned by investigating judges, who were expected to issue a judicial order that would see the 65-year-old formally detained by the court.   "Duch was brought to the (tribunal) for an initial interview," spokesman Reach Sambath told news agency AFP, stressing that Duch was not yet convicted of any crimes.   Duch is one of five former leaders widely thought to be under investigation by tribunal judges. His transfer to the tribunal is the most concrete step taken so far in Cambodia''s efforts to try those responsible for one of the worst atrocities of the 20th century.   Up to two million people died of starvation and overwork, or were executed, under the Khmer Rouge''s 1975-79 communist regime.   It also abolished religion, schools and currency, exiling millions to vast collective farms in a bid to create an agrarian utopia.   These crimes were part of a "common criminal plan constituting a systematic and unlawful denial of basic rights", prosecutors said earlier this month after submitting their cases for investigation.   The names of all those under investigation have not been made public. But prosecutors are reportedly also seeking charges of genocide and other crimes against former Khmer Rouge head of state Khieu Samphan, as well as regime leader Pol Pot''s deputy Nuon Chea and foreign minister Ieng Sary.   Duch ran the Khmer Rouge''s notorious Tuol Sleng prison, a former high school that was converted into a torture centre. Some 16,000 men, women and children were brutalised there for months before being taken to the outskirts of the capital and executed.   But his lawyer, Kar Savuth, said Duch was not guilty of any crimes and was only following "verbal orders from the top".   Tuol Sleng, in the centre of Cambodia''s capital Phnom Penh, has been turned into a genocide museum.Hundreds of mug shots of its former inmates are on display, along with torture devices and paintings graphically depicting the abuses inflicted on those imprisoned in Tuol Sleng.   After years of talks, the United Nations and Cambodia agreed in 2003 to a complex joint tribunal to try former Khmer Rouge leaders. The three-year process has been under way for a year, with prosecutors compiling cases against suspects.   Trials are expected next year in what many see as the last chance for Cambodians to get justice for crimes committed by the regime.   Pol Pot died in 1998, and rights groups and legal advocates are concerned that other ageing figures from the regime - most of whom live freely in Cambodia - will also die before being brought to court.
	Philippine top judge to seek justice in unsolved murders of journalists by Committee to Protect Journalists   Manila, July 27, 2007   The chief justice of the Philippine Supreme Court told a delegation from the Committee to Protect Journalists that he will seek justice in the unsolved killings of journalists and will use his authority to protect freedom of speech and of the press.   “The fact that the killings remain unsolved heightens public distrust in our system of justice,” said Chief Justice Reynato S. Puno.   CPJ’s research shows that 32 journalists have been killed in direct relation to their work in the Philippines since 1992, making it the world’s fifth deadliest nation for journalists during that time period. The impunity rate in these cases is well over 90 percent, CPJ research shows.   “We’re pleased by Chief Justice Puno’s comments and hope the Supreme Court, along with the other branches of the Philippine government, will continue to take steps to bring to justice the killers of journalists,” said CPJ Executive Director Joel Simon.   Reacting to public indignation after a series of political killings and disappearances, Puno convened a national summit on extrajudicial killings earlier this month. Under the country’s 1987 Constitution, the Supreme Court has the authority to “promulgate rules concerning the protection and enforcement of constitutional rights.” Puno has convened a committee to draft measures that will make it easier for the victims of killings to seek redress. The rules could also address freedom of expression concerns.   Simon and CPJ board member Sheila S. Coronel were in Manila this week to meet with journalists and government officials to discuss strategies for combating impunity for the killers of journalists.   “While we are encouraged by the recent progress much more needs to be done,” said Coronel. “Murder is the ultimate form of censorship and the unsolved killings represent a fundamental attack on freedom of expression. The government must combat the problem at every level.”   Coronel, the co-founder and former executive director of the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism, is director of the Stabile Center for Investigative Journalism at Columbia University.
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