Phnom Penh – A former Khmer Rouge official photographer has put on sale for 1.5 million dollars what he claims to be Pol Pot’s clothes, sandals and toilet, along with thousands of photographs and other artifacts he collected during the genocidal regime’s 1975-79 rule. “I will sell Pol Pot’s sandals, toilet, his uniform and cap, thousands of photographs and the two cameras I used during the Khmer Rouge period,” said Nhem En, who was recruited to take photographs of detainees when they arrived at Tuol Sleng torture prison in Phnom Penh.

“I am asking for 1.5 million dollars, but the price is negotiable,” he added. Nhem En said he would use the money to establish a Khmer Rouge museum in Anlong Veng, a small town near the Thai border where the Maoist group hid in a jungle fortress until it disbanded in 1998. “I am selling these items, but I have others that will be housed in the museum,” he said. “I have already asked for donations for this museum from the US, France, Germany, Canada, Australia, Vietnam, South Korea and Thailand, but none have provided funding.”His appeal came as the trial of the former head of Tuol Sleng prison resumed before Cambodia’s UN-backed war crimes tribunal.

Kaing Guek Euv, known by his revolutionary alias Duch, faces charges of crimes against humanity, torture, premeditated murder and breaches of the Geneva Conventions, allegedly committed at the school-turned-prison, where at least 15,000 men, women and children were imprisoned and tortured before being murdered in the “killing fields” on the outskirts of the capital. Nhem En said the millions of dollars in international donor funding spent on bringing Duch and four other Khmer Rouge leaders to trial would be better invested in his museum.

“Nobody in the Cambodian government supports my museum plan, so it will need a great deal of international funding to be established,” he said. In April, Nhem En offered to sell Pol Pot’s shoes and toilet for 500,000 dollars and said he would keep the other items to be housed in the museum. Up to 2 million people died during through execution, starvation or overwork during the Khmer Rouge’s rule

First published in Earth Times

Mr Hun Sen, himself a former low-level commander for the communist movement, made his comments as the tribunal’s first trial heard the regime’s prison chief express remorse for his crimes.

Another four senior Khmer Rouge members are also being held by the tribunal but the Cambodian co-prosecutor has opposed pursuing six more suspects on the grounds it could destabilise the country.

‘I would like to say that I prefer for this court to fail… I won’t allow war to re-occur in Cambodia,’ Mr Hun Sen said at the opening of a street named after him in the seaside town of Sihanoukville.

‘It is my absolute position. So please try these few people (already in detention),’ added Mr Hun Sen, who himself has never been implicated in any of the regime’s crimes.

‘For example, if we try 20 more people… the country will erupt into war killing hundreds of thousands of people. Who would resolve this problem?’

The Khmer Rouge were ousted by Vietnamese-led forces in 1979 after nearly four years of iron-fisted rule during which up to two million people died, but continued to fight a civil war until 1998.

The arrest of Khmer Rouge prison chief Duch – the first of five former regime leaders due to face trial – has been lauded by rights groups, but there have been allegations of interference by Mr Hun Sen’s administration.

As judges mull whether to open cases against other Khmer Rouge members, the administration has been accused of trying to protect former cadres who are now in government.

After Duch’s trial, the court plans to prosecute former Khmer Rouge ideologue Nuon Chea, head of state Khieu Samphan, foreign minister Ieng Sary and his wife, minister of social affairs Ieng Thirith. — AFP