The Phnom Penh Post

A very exciting development for those of us trying to keep up with ECCC developments from abroad: the tribunal has launched a “virtual court.”

"The Virtual Tribunal will be a groundbreaking way for the [tribunal] to digitally make available to the public all trial related materials such as decisions, filings, trial transcripts and video of the court proceedings," according to Voice of America. 

U.S. univerities partnering with the effort include Stanford and the University of California, Berkeley.

Last week, I had the opportunity to hear Clint Williamson, U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for war crimes issues, speak to a crowd of Rutgers students and professors about international justice efforts in a number of different countries.  While it wasn't the sole focus of his presentation, Williamson did discuss the Khmer Rouge tribunal, and I was pleased with what he had to say.

For starters, he thinks corruption problems at the court are currently "under control" and pointed out that a court administrator had been removed from his post due to these concerns. (By this, I can only assume he was referring to Sean Visoth, former administration head, who went on extended sick leave and never returned.)

He went on to describe the tribunal as having "more of an impact on the population than any court that has been created." Williamson said that 15,000 Cambodians thusfar have attended proceedings and the ECCC has introduced a whole new generation of Cambodians to their history. While handing out Khmer Rouge textbooks on a recent trip, he said, "the kids couldn't take their noses out of the books."