FAR EAST CORRESPONDENT — Old hatreds die hard, and nowhere has this been more evident than at the trial of surviving Khmer Rouge leaders in Phnom Penh. It has been an historic week, with former ideologue Nuon Chea taking the stand while Former Foreign Minister Ieng Sary and one-time head of state Khieu Samphan watched on.

Nuon Chea attempted to portray himself as a noble Khmer. As a young man, he said he had developed a “passion for justice” after witnessing the harsh handling of Cambodian peasants by the Colonial French and rich landowners who “treated them as slaves,”

His resentment of the rich and French was surpassed only by the Vietnamese, who he insisted wanted only to swallow Cambodia like a python devouring a deer. Read more in The Diplomat.