Monitoring group outlines challenges to Khmer Rouge trial

Updated August 21, 2009 19:34:10

Cambodia's long-awaited Khmer Rouge tribunal is in full swing in Phnom Penh, with the first trial under way for Kaing Guek Eav, better known as Duch, the head of the Tuol Sleng torture prison. At least 12-thousand people were tortured at S-21, as the Phnom Penh centre was also known, and killed at a nearby field. They were part of the estimated 1.7 million Cambodians who died during the Khmer Rouge reign in the late 1970s. But the search for justice has been mired in scandals over allegations of political interference and corruption among Cambodian staff within the trial, which is run jointly with the UN.

Presenter:Liam Cochrane
Speaker: Heather Ryan, who monitors Cambodia's Khmer Rouge tribunal on behalf of Open Society Justice Initiative