Several events of note so far this month:

1. The tribunal on December 2 announced the appointment of veteran war crimes lawyer Andrew Cayley as international co-prosecutor, filling a position that was left vacant by the departure of Robert Petit in September.

2. Judges ruled on December 8 that joint criminal enterprise, a controversial form of liability under which suspects can be found responsible for crimes committed as part of a common plan, could apply at the tribunal, setting the stage for further debate on the issue between prosecutors and lawyers for the four regime leaders awaiting trial.

3. And the Pre-Trial Chamber on December 9 dismissed a request, filed in October by the defence team for former Khmer Rouge leader Ieng Sary, for the dismissal of International Co-Investigating Judge Marcel Lemonde on bias charges. The defence team had earlier this month supplemented its request with allegations stemming from a December 2 witness statement given by Wayne Bastin, the same former staffer who in October accused Lemonde of communicating a preference for inculpatory rather than exculpatory evidence. In the December 2 statement, Bastin charged that Lemonde had compromised the confidentiality of his office's work and communicated inappropriately with a prosecution expert. The Pre-Trial Chamber declined to consider the supplementary filing before handing down its December 9 ruling, though the Ieng Sary team has since filed a new request for Lemonde's disqualification based on the December 2 statement.