PHNOM PENH (AFP) — A distraught survivor of the Khmer Rouge's main prison has urged his former jailer to reveal the truth about his wife's execution three decades ago so he could finally collect her ashes.
Bou Meng was asked by the judge at Cambodia's war crimes court to compose himself as he testified against prison chief Duch, accused of overseeing the extermination of 15,000 people at the communist regime's Tuol Sleng prison.
The 68-year-old also described how his torturers beat him bloody to make him confess to being a CIA spy, but said that he escaped his wife's fate after he was put to work painting pictures of Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot.
"There is a question I would like to ask to Mr. Kaing Guek Eav," Bou Meng said, using Duch's full name.
"I want to know if he asked his subordinates to smash my wife at (Tuol Sleng) or Choeung Ek (the so-called killing field where prisoners were executed) so I can collect her ashes to make her soul rest in peace."
Bou Meng said that under the regime he first worked at a technical school, then was made to build dams and canals and finally planted vegetables before he and his wife were taken in 1977 to Tuol Sleng.
"My wife and I put our hands behind our backs, and then they cut our hands. Then my wife cried and said, 'What did we do wrong? We are both orphans,'" said Bou Meng, the third survivor to testify this week.
The couple were then blindfolded with black cloth, Bou Meng said, and he realised they were being sent to prison as they were taken to be photographed.
"That (Tuol Sleng photo) is the only photograph I have of my wife with me today," Bou Meng said.
The court was shown the photo of his wife, Ma Yoeun, who Bou Meng said was about 25 at the time. With the number 331 pinned to her black shirt, she looks directly from the frame with a worried, pleading expression.
Bou Meng said that during torture sessions blood flowed to the floor.
"(My torturer) asked me to count the lashes. And when I got to 10 lashes he said, 'How can you get to 10 lashes? You've only had one lash,'" he recalled, taking out a handkerchief to wipe his eyes.
"Every time they beat me up, they asked me questions. When did I join the CIA and who introduced me to the CIA network? I did not know what a CIA agent or network was, so how could I respond?" he added.
As Bou Meng wept, the presiding judge at the UN-backed tribunal, Nil Nonn, asked him to "be strong" so he could deliver testimony.
"If your emotion overwhelms you, it is unlikely we'll get another time to hear your account," Nil Nonn said. "This is a day you have been waiting for for so long. I know you are feeling emotional."
Bou Meng recovered and told the court how in late 1977 or early 1978 he was spared because of his artistic ability painting three-metre-high (10 feet) canvasses of the secretive Khmer Rouge "Brother Number One".
"I survived because I could paint an exact portrait of Pol Pot," he said, adding that Duch often visited the workshop and gave instructions -- including to omit an apparent lump on Pol Pot's neck.
"He ordered me: 'You should adjust the throat. It's not a tumour -- it's just fat," Bou Meng said.
But he contradicted testimony by fellow artist and prisoner Van Nath, who said that Duch once kicked Bou Meng in the head. Duch, however, did one day order him and another prisoner to fight each other with black plastic tubing.
"He sat there watching us beat each other up. After a while, he ordered us to stop," Bou Meng said. "He did not treat me like a human being."
Earlier in his trial for war crimes and crimes against humanity, the 66-year-old Duch begged forgiveness from the victims after accepting responsibility for his role in governing the jail.
But he has consistently rejected claims by prosecutors that he was a central figure in the hierarchy of the Khmer Rouge -- under which up to two million people died -- and says he never personally executed anyone.
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