Chris Stephen: Minor miracle of international justice for Cambodia

IT HAS taken three-and-a-half decades, but finally one of the perpetrators of Cambodia's genocide has been jailed.

Victim's families are unhappy that Kaing Guck Eav will spend 19 years in jail, rather than life, for orchestrating a brutal regime of violence and depravity at the notorious S-21 prison. Yet the fact this trial has happened at all is a minor miracle.

After the horrors of the Khmer Rouge regime, Cambodia finally got a reasonably democratic government in 1993, but that government stalled on a UN offer to set up an international court. Ten years later, as prospects of a successful war crimes process were withering and Pol Pot had died from natural causes, a compromise was agreed where the UN, while paying most of the bills, agreed to support, rather than administer, the court.

Even then, the government has ensured that this tribunal, with a mix of Cambodian and international judges, is limited in scope. Only five of Pol Pot's henchmen are on trial, and there are no plans for more prosecutions, with critics saying the government has limited the tribunal's reach as many of its members were formerly low-ranking officials in the Khmer Rouge.

This is in stark contrast to UN courts for Former Yugoslavia, Rwanda and Sierra Leone, where much wider investigations have jailed scores of warlords, generals and politicians.

Adding to its troubles, the Cambodian tribunal, officially named the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia, is being investigated by the UN over alleged abuse of 30 million in international funding.

Yet with its first verdict, the court is at least a reality. It comes as war crimes justice is spreading across the globe, both in scope and controversy. The UN has ordered panels to study alleged crimes in Gaza and Sri Lanka, while increasing numbers of states, the latest being Bangladesh, have begun trials for atrocities committed by their own past regimes. Supporters of war crimes justice hope these processes will provide a credible deterrent for future warlords in future wars.