Cash For War Crimes Trial

Still more signs of a story brewing abroad that we predict will eventually be a feature in Australian media.

IPS Inter Press Service News Agency today carries an detailed account of the UN launch for international funding for a tribunal to prosecute surviving leaders of the Khmer Rouge.

The United States refused to donate, saying it had already given seven million dollars to Cambodia over the last decade for documentation and research for the crimes committed there.

While I-newswire also gives an account of the UN launch and exact financial details as to what pledges have so far been raised.

Placing the pledging conference into an historical context, Sean Visoth, Executive Secretary of the Royal Task Force on the Khmer Rouge Trials, in a message read out on behalf of Cambodia’s Deputy Prime Minister, Sok An, noted that this April would mark the thirtieth anniversary of the Khmer Rouge’s coming to power.
On 17 April 1975, [editors' note: anouther date to watch for in world media coverage] the people had celebrated the end of a bitter and tragic war, flooding the streets of Phnom Penh to welcome the liberating troops.
That happiness, however, had been short lived. Plunged into a nightmare that lasted three years, eight months and twenty days, Cambodia had lost a quarter of the population -– about 3 million people –- to starvation, untreated illness, torture and execution.

It ranks Australia's place as current at fourth among the donations: Japan $21,600,000; France $4,800,000; United Kingdom $2,870,000; Australia $2,350,000; Netherlands $2,000,000; Canada $1,610,000; Germany $1,000,000; Norway $1,000,000; Denmark $525,000; Austria $360,000; Sweden $150,000; Republic of Korea $150,000; and Luxembourg $66,000.