Leading The Santebal and Tuol Sleng
After the Khmer Rouge victory in April 1975 Duch and his men set up prisons throughout the capital including the infamous Tuol Sleng prison. Duch's request for a transfer in May 1975 to the Industrial Sector of government was denied. The Tuol Sleng prison camp was initially headed by In Lon aka Comrade Nath with Duch acting as deputy. Subsequently, In Lon was transferred and Duch promoted to be the Director. By May 1976 all the prisons in Phnom Penh were consolidated and relocated to Tuol Sleng. Prisons like Tuol Sleng were created to cleanse the ranks of the Khmer Rouge of suspected enemies of the revolution.
Duch ordered the execution of prisoners after their interrogation was completed. For example, on a list containing the names of 17 prisoners (eight teenagers and nine children), he wrote the order “Smash them to pieces.” On a longer list of detainees, his annotation reads “smash: 115; keep: 44 persons.” The text below this annotation reads “Comrade Duch proposed to Angkar; Angkar agreed.” On a list of 20 female detainees, Duch wrote annotations for each of them, ordering: “take away for execution,” “keep for interrogation” or “medical experiment". At least 100 detainees died after having their blood drawn for transfusions for wounded soldiers. Surgical operations were also performed on detainees in order to train medical staff.
Duch impressed his superiors with his work and was appointed the head of Democratic Kampuchea's dreaded "special branch" – the Santebal.
As the party purges increased towards the end of the Democratic Kampuchea period, more and more people were brought to Duch, including many former colleagues including his predecessor at Tuol Sleng, In Lon. Throughout this period, Duch built up a large archive of prison records, mug shots and extracted "confessions".
On 7 January 1979, Duch was amongst the last Khmer Rouge cadres to flee Phnom Penh after it fell to the Vietnamese army. Though he was unable to destroy much of the prison's extensive documents, he saw to the execution of several surviving prisoners before he fled the city.
Read more about this topic: Kang Kek Iew
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