Assembly for Peace

Cases of Practice | Accountability Mechanisms or Bodies

Last updated 30 August 2024This case study was part of the Assembly for Peace Handbook (2024).

Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (2003)

Through an agreement with the Government of Cambodia, the General Assembly helped establish a judicial accountability body to prosecute crimes committed during the Khmer Rouge period.

Related practice summary: Accountability

In 2003, the GA formally approved an agreement between the Government of Cambodia and the UN concerning the prosecution under Cambodia law of crimes committed during the regime of Democratic Kampuchea in its resolution 57/228 (A/RES/57/228B). It was formally established by the Cambodian National Assembly in 2001, began operations in February 2006 and became fully operational in June 2007.1 Prior to the agreement, the GA had both requested the Secretary-General to appoint a Group of Experts to explore accountability options in Cambodia (established under GA resolution 52/135) and urged the Government of Cambodia to reach an agreement with the UN for the establishment of the ECCC in multiple resolutions between 1998 and 2002.2

In the years following its establishment, the GA provided institutional support for the ECCC, mainly by approving subvention grants for its operations. Since 2001, the ECCC has convicted three senior Khmer Rouge leaders.3 In 2023, the ECCC entered a residual phase, maintaining residual functions for an initial period of three years.4

Some scholars have argued that the approval of a treaty-based criminal tribunal through a GA resolution (the “ECCC model”) could offer a modality through which the GA could be involved in the creation of a tribunal in the future.5

Notes

  1. The ECCC operated under voluntary contributions from the international community. However, the GA has reported a steady decline in voluntary contributions “from 65 per cent of the approved 2015 budget to 31 per cent of the approved budget in 2023”, and highlighted the need for “intensified fundraising efforts to support the residual activities of the Extraordinary Chambers” (A/78/7/Add.21). ↩︎
  2. A/RES/52/135 (1998); A/RES/53/145 (1999); A/RES/54/171 (2000); A/RES/55/95 (2001); A/RES/56/169 (2002). ↩︎
  3. For detail of the three cases concluded by the ECCC see A/75/809 (2021). ↩︎
  4. This residual phase was anticipated and was set out in a 2021 GA resolution (A/RES/75/257 B). For discussion of the authorities remaining in this residual phase see Nicole Cochran and Andrew Wells-Dang, “Never again? The legacy of Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge trials”, United States Institute of Peace, 3 October 2022. ↩︎
  5. Carsten Stahn, “From ‘Uniting for Peace’ to ‘Uniting for Justice?’”, p. 267. ↩︎
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