Nuon Chea died in hospital, according to the Extraordinary Chambers in The Courts of Cambodia (ECCC). The United Nations-backed tribunal court was formed in 2006 to prosecute Khmer Rouge figures for alleged violations of international law during the Cambodian genocide.
He was already serving life sentence in Cambodia after being found guilty of crimes against humanity in 2014.
The pair were also found guilty of murder, extermination, deportation, enslavement, imprisonment, torture, persecution on political, religious and racial grounds, and other inhumane acts.
About a quarter of Cambodia’s population — at least 1.7 million people — are believed to have died during that period, from forced labor, starvation and execution.
During its time in power, the Khmer Rouge regime attempted to create a purely agrarian society through ruthless social engineering policies.
In 2001, Cambodia’s National Assembly voted to create a court to try the crimes of those associated with the regime.
But for many, the few convictions that have followed have done little to heal wounds left by the Khmer Rouge.
Nuon Chea was born in 1926. After the collapse in 1979 of Democratic Kampuchea, as Cambodia was known, he remained a leading Khmer Rouge figure as the movement operated as a rebel guerrilla force in the country’s west.
He surrendered in 1998, striking a deal with the government that allowed him to live as a free man near the Thai border until his arrest in 2007, according to the ECCC.
In his final statement to the court, Nuon Chea admitted he carried “moral responsibility” for events during the period, but also affirmed his innocence.
Source : Nbcnewyork