By Didier Lauras
AFP
PHNOM PENH — A last-minute bid for release by Khmer Rouge jail chief Duch has underscored deep rifts between foreign and Cambodian staff that threaten the UN-backed court, officials and diplomats said.
Duch's defence strategy imploded on the final day of his trial Friday, when he suddenly demanded his release after months of admitting responsibility. Then his international and local lawyers put forward opposing arguments.
French counsel Francois Roux asked judges to consider Duch's remorse in a bid to reduce a possible 40-year sentence. But his Cambodian colleague Kar Savuth said the court was not competent to hold the trial.
"There are, in Cambodia, a number of people who do not want this court," Roux told AFP, hinting that the strategy of his colleague, the lawyer of Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen, was motivated by political objectives.
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