Lawyers for former Khmer Rouge Foreign Minister Ieng Sary may not intervene in an appeal by the prosecution against the indictment of former S-21 Chairman Kaing Guek Eav, the Khmer Rouge tribunal ruled Monday.
The ruling by the Pre-Trial Chamber denied a request Ieng Sary’s lawyers made last month to argue against the legal doctrine known as joint criminal enterprise, which they say could be used to hold their client, and all five of the court’s Khmer Rouge detainees, equally responsible for all crimes alleged against them.
Monday’s ruling now limits contention over the joint criminal enterprise theory, which Ieng Sary’s lawyers, Michael Karnavas and Ang Udom, have attacked but which prosecutors have sought to use in the Aug 8 indictment of Kaing Guek Eav, also known as Duch, and in their initial allegations made last year against all of the court’s current detainees.
Prosecutors last month lodged an appeal against the indictment of Duch, saying it had failed to charge him with membership in such a joint enterprise and should be altered to do so. In a Sept 15 request to the Pre-Trial Chamber, Ieng Sary’s lawyers said the outcome of the appeal would affect their client and asked to be allowed to argue against the use of joint criminal enterprise.
The Pre-Trial Chamber ruled Monday that the Ieng Sary defense had no right to intervene in the appeal, as Duch and Ieng Sary have been investigated separately.
“The appeal lodged by the co-prosecutors concerns the charges for which Duch will be sent to trial. The decision to be delivered by the Pre-Trial Chamber will therefore not be directly applicable to Ieng Sary,” the judges found.
In a July motion, Karnavas and Ang Udom asked for a public hearing on joint criminal enterprise, which they said risked implicating many in Cambodia’s governing class, who the lawyers said could unjustly be included in a joint criminal enterprise.
The Co-Investigating Judges on Sept 16 gave all parties until the end of the year to submit responses.
