UNITED NATIONS, Sept 27, 2007 (AFP) - The United States will contribute five million dollars to the UN-backed international tribunal to try suspects in the 2005 murder of Lebanese ex-premier Rafiq Hariri, its UN ambassador said Thursday.

Zalmay Khalilzad said Washington was providing the funding to help start up the tribunal 'to reflect our commitment to the process of accountability for political murders, assassinations that have taken place in Lebanon.'

THE HAGUE, Sept 26, 2007 (AFP) - The judges of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) on Thursday re-elected Italian judge Fausto Pocar, 68, as president, the UN court said.

The Italian academic became an ICTY judge in February 2000 and has been the court's president since November 2005. The vice president will remain Australian judge Kevin Parker, 70, who specialized in maritime law.

PHNOM PENH, Sept 26, 2007 (AFP) - Cambodian staff to the country's genocide tribunal must sign a code of conduct pledging against graft as the UN-backed court grapples with a job-buying scandal, a statement said Wednesday.

The move follows accusations made earlier this year by a legal watchdog that some Cambodia officials had kicked back part of their salaries in exchange for positions on the tribunal, set up to try former Khmer Rouge leaders.

PHNOM PENH, Sept 24, 2007 (AFP) - Former Khmer Rouge head of state Khieu Samphan is ready to go before Cambodia's UN-backed genocide tribunal, his wife told AFP Monday, as momentum builds towards prosecuting regime leaders.

The French-educated radical who was the public face of the Khmer Rouge remains free in Cambodia and has repeatedly denied responsibility for the atrocities that occurred under the 1975-79 communist regime.

But he is likely one of five suspects being investigated by the court.

PHNOM PENH, Sept 23, 2007 (AFP) - A Cambodian human rights coalition on Sunday called on a UN-backed tribunal to make sure the recently detained Khmer Rouge leader Nuon Chea gets proper healthcare so he is able to stand trial.

It said it was concerned that 81-year-old Nuon Chea, arrested Wednesday and charged with crimes against humanity, could die before answering for his role in one of the 20th century's worst genocides.

PHNOM PENH, Sept 22, 2007 (AFP) - Detained Khmer Rouge leader Nuon Chea wants different food and a new toilet in his cell at a UN-backed genocide court where he is awaiting trial on war crimes, his lawyer said Saturday.

The most senior surviving leader of the murderous Khmer Rouge regime was arrested early Wednesday in his home in northwest Cambodia and brought to the capital where he was put in the tribunal's custody.

The lawyer, Son Arun, said Nuon Chea had complained about the high-calorie meals provided by the tribunal.

PHNOM PENH, Sept 21, 2007 (AFP) - Khmer Rouge leader Nuon Chea, who is in the custody of Cambodia's UN-backed genocide court on war crimes charges, went for a medical check-up Friday, officials at the tribunal said.

'His health is fine although he is an older person,' court spokesman Reach Sambath said after doctors examined the 82-year-old.

Nuon Chea underwent the check-up, which took several hours, at Phnom Penh's French-funded Calmette hospital.

PHNOM PENH, Sept 21, 2007 (AFP) - Jailed Khmer Rouge leader Nuon Chea, who was arrested earlier this week, has disputed charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity filed against him, court documents filed Friday revealed.

'Nuon Chea disputed the crimes with which he is charged, indicating that he would be ashamed to have committed such crimes,' said a detention order from the UN-backed genocide tribunal, which is holding the most senior surviving regime leader.

PHNOM PENH, Sept 21, 2007 (AFP) - On his first day in the custody of Cambodia's UN-backed genocide tribunal, former Khmer Rouge chief Nuon Chea watched television and exercised in the detention enclosure next to the court.

'He's in very strong spirits -- his health is fine,' said tribunal spokesman Reach Sambath on Thursday of the 82-year-old.

Nuon Chea, the most senior surviving leader of the murderous Khmer Rouge regime, was arrested in his home in northwest Cambodia and brought to the capital Phnom Penh on Wednesday.

ARUSHA, Tanzania, Sept 20, 2007 (AFP) - The UN war crimes court for Rwanda is working with German authorities to extradite a genocide suspect arrested near Frankfurt this week, a spokesman said Thursday.

Augustin Ngirabatware, Rwanda's ex-planning minister, was arrested on Monday under a warrant issued by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) which wants him for his role in the 1994 genocide that killed some 800,000 people.

PHNOM PENH, Sept 20, 2007 (AFP) - The arrest of the Khmer Rouge regime's top surviving leader will lend much-needed credibility to Cambodia's beleaguered UN-backed genocide court, analysts say, but is only a small step on the road to justice.

They warn that the complicated process of bringing former regime leaders to justice could yet become tangled in the bickering and allegations of political interference that have marred the proceedings so far.

PHNOM PENH, Sept 19, 2007 (AFP) - Nearly three decades after the fall of Cambodia's Khmer Rouge, its most senior surviving leader Nuon Chea became the first former top cadre to be formally charged by the UN-backed tribunal.

Nuon Chea, now 82 and once the most trusted lieutenant of Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot, was charged with war crimes and crimes against humanity after being arrested at his home earlier Wednesday, a court spokesman told AFP.

PHNOM PENH, Sept 19, 2007 (AFP) - Arrogant, intimidating and unrepentant, Nuon Chea -- the most senior surviving Khmer Rouge leader -- strongly denies that he played a role in one of the worst atrocities of the 20th century.

'I wasn't involved in the killing of people,' he told AFP in July, shortly after prosecutors at Cambodia's UN-backed Khmer Rouge tribunal had filed their first cases, asking judges to investigate five suspects.

PHNOM PENH, Sept 19, 2007 (AFP) - The Khmer Rouge's most senior surviving leader Nuon Chea was formally charged Wednesday with war crimes and crimes against humanity, a spokesman for Cambodia's UN-backed genocide tribunal said.

'The co-investigating judges charged him with crimes against humanity and also with war crimes,' spokesman Reach Sambath told AFP, adding that he had been placed in the tribunal's custody pending further investigation.

PHNOM PENH, Sept 19, 2007 (AFP) - Top Khmer Rouge leader Nuon Chea was formally charged Wednesday with war crimes and crimes against humanity, a spokesman for Cambodia's UN-backed genocide tribunal told AFP.

'The co-investigating judges charged him with crimes against humanity and also with war crimes. The judges have put him in provisional detention' pending further investigation, spokesman Reach Sambath said.

PAILIN, Cambodia, Sept 19, 2007 (AFP) - The murderous Khmer Rouge regime's most senior surviving leader was arrested Wednesday, plucked from his home in the Cambodian jungle to face justice at long-delayed genocide trials.

Nuon Chea, now 82 and once the most trusted lieutenant of Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot, is the first of a small group of former top cadres living freely in Cambodia to be arrested by the new UN-backed tribunal.

PHNOM PENH, Sept 19, 2007 (AFP) - Top Khmer Rouge leader Nuon Chea was formally arrested Wednesday by a UN-backed genocide tribunal, court officials said after police earlier seized him from his home in northwest Cambodia.

'Nuon Chea arrived at the court. He was brought before the office of the co-investigating judges... on execution of an arrest warrant,' tribunal spokesman Reach Sambath told AFP.

He said Nuon Chea would be informed of the charges being brought against him, but did not say what those charges would be.

PAILIN, Cambodia, Sept 19, 2007 (AFP) - A shaking, frail old man being helped to dress by police officers. That was one woman's last glimpse of Nuon Chea, a former Khmer Rouge leader who allegedly devised the regime's brutal machinery of death.

Peering through the window of Nuon Chea's house moments before he was led away by authorities Wednesday, Sok Sothera, a neighbour in this tiny jungle hamlet in northwest Cambodia, told AFP 'he was shaking.'

PAILIN, Cambodia, Sept 19, 2007 (AFP) - Top Khmer Rouge leader Nuon Chea was detained by police and officials from a UN-backed genocide tribunal Wednesday and taken from his home in the Cambodian jungle.

An AFP correspondent saw him being driven from his home and put on a nearby military helicoptor in the company of court officers and Cambodian authorities, to be flown to the capital Phnom Penh.

'Nuon Chea has been shown a warrant, but I don't know what it is for or what crimes he has been charged with,' a source close to him told AFP while also boarding the chopper.

PAILIN, Cambodia, Sept 19, 2007 (AFP) - The murderous Khmer Rouge regime's most senior surviving leader was detained Wednesday, taken from his home in the Cambodian jungle by police and officials from a UN-backed genocide court.

An AFP correspondent saw Nuon Chea being driven from his home in northwest Cambodia and put on a helicopter.

He was expected to be flown to the capital Phnom Penh.

'Nuon Chea has been shown a warrant but I don't know what it is for or what crimes he has been charged with,' a source close to him told AFP while also boarding the chopper.

PAILIN, Cambodia, Sept 19, 2007 (AFP) - The murderous Khmer Rouge regime's most senior surviving leader was questioned by police and court officials at his home in the Cambodian jungle Wednesday, a source close to him told AFP.

Earlier police blockaded the road leading to Nuon Chea's house in northwest Cambodia as officials from a UN-backed genocide tribunal swept in at dawn.

The 82-year-old, known as 'Brother Number Two', was Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot's most trusted lieutenant and allegedly a key architect for the regime's horrific execution policies.

PAILIN, Cambodia, Sept 19, 2007 (AFP) - The most senior surviving Khmer Rouge leader, Nuon Chea, was being questioned Wednesday by police and officials from Cambodia's UN-backed genocide tribunal, a source close to him told AFP.

Police had earlier sealed off Nuon Chea's house in northwest Cambodia as the tribunal officials swept in, raising speculation that he could be arrested for crimes allegedly committed by the 1970s regime.

PAILIN, Cambodia, Sept 19, 2007 (AFP) - Officials from the UN-backed Khmer Rouge genocide tribunal Wednesday visited the home of the regime's most senior surviving leader in Cambodia, raising speculation he was set to be arrested.

Police blocked the road to the house of Nuon Chea in northwest Cambodia as the tribunal officials swept in.

Shortly after 6:00 am (2300 GMT Tuesday) a convoy of police and Khmer Rouge tribunal vehicles was seen arriving at Nuon Chea's house, where he has lived freely since surrendering to the government in late 1998.

UNITED NATIONS, Sept 14, 2007 (AFP) - The UN Security Council voted unanimously Friday to reappoint Hassan Bubacar Jallow of Gambia to another four-year term as UN war crimes prosecutor for Rwanda.

But Jallow's second tenure, which begins Saturday, may end sooner by the 15-member council if the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) completes its work by the 2010 target date.

UNITED NATIONS, Sept 14, 2007 (AFP) - The UN Security Council on Friday voted to keep Carla Del Ponte, the outgoing UN war crimes prosecutor for the former Yugoslavia, in her post until the end of the year.

Fourteen members of the 15-member body voted in favor of the resolution extending Del Ponte's mandate, which expired Friday, until December 31, citing 'the need to ensure a smooth transition' between her departure and the assumption of office of her successor, who has yet to be named.

PHNOM PENH, Sept 10, 2007 (AFP) - Cambodia's former king said he would refuse to testify at the country's Khmer Rouge genocide tribunal after being snubbed by court officials.

Norodom Sihanouk had requested a weekend meeting with officials to explain his conduct during the Khmer Rouge regime, which saw as many as two million people killed.

The 84-year-old former monarch said on his website Monday that he had been told that his invitation to a tribunal spokesman had been refused because the spokesman was not authorised to hold such a meeting.

PHNOM PENH, Sept 5, 2007 (AFP) - 'I always have nightmares about being chased by something black, a shadow,' says doctor Sotheara Chhim, describing the aftermath of peering into the dark places most Cambodians are trying to forget.

'It is not something clear, but it is probably relevant to the Khmer Rouge,' says Chhim, one of only 26 psychiatrists providing care for a rising tide of Cambodians who are no longer able to cope with the damage caused by the brutalities of the past.

PHNOM PENH, Aug 29, 2007 (AFP) - Former Khmer Rouge jailer Duch, the only suspect held by Cambodia's UN-backed genocide tribunal, has appealed his pre-trial detention by the court, his lawyer said Wednesday.

Duch, whose real name is Kaing Guek Eav, is the first suspect to be detained by the court for crimes committed during the communist regime's 1975-79 rule, with court judges ordering his arrest last month pending an investigation.

Kar Savuth, one of Duch's lawyers, told AFP that his client had filed an appeal, but refused to comment further.

CHIANG MAI, Thailand, Aug 26, 2007 (AFP) - French ethnologist Francois Bizot survived three months in a Khmer Rouge camp led by a man who is widely believed to be one of the regime's most notorious torturers.

Thirty-six years later, Bizot says he is ready to testify at Cambodia's UN-backed genocide tribunal, which on July 31 detained his one-time captor Duch on charges of crimes against humanity.

'It's possible that I will testify,' Bizot told AFP in an interview in the northern Thai city of Chiang Mai, where he settled after fleeing Cambodia.

GENEVA, Aug 23, 2007 (AFP) - The outgoing chief prosecutor of the UN tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, Carla Del Ponte, will become Switzerland's ambassador to Argentina in January, the Swiss foreign ministry said Thursday.

Del Ponte's mandate as prosecutor had been due to expire in September, but last month she accepted UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's request to stay on until the end of December.

The UN Security Council appointed the 60 year-old Swiss former regional prosecutor to bring war criminals from ex-Yugoslavia to justice in 1999.

PHNOM PENH, Aug 23, 2007 (AFP) - Two UN envoys said Thursday the transfer of a key judge from Cambodia's genocide tribunal was politically motivated, amid fears the move could further delay the trials of former Khmer Rouge leaders.

You Bunleng, one of the court's co-investigating judges, was appointed head of Cambodia's Appeal Court, forcing him to quit the UN-backed tribunal intended to prosecute those behind one of the 20th century's worst atrocities.

He had been seen as crucial to determining which suspects would go on trial.

PHNOM PENH, Aug 22, 2007 (AFP) - The United Nations Wednesday urged Cambodia not to transfer a key judge away from the country's genocide trials amid concerns his departure could delay efforts to try former Khmer Rouge leaders.

You Bunleng, one of the court's co-investigating judges, was appointed head of Cambodia's Appeal Court last week, forcing him to quit the UN-backed tribunal intended to prosecute one of the 20th century's worst atrocities.

He had been seen as crucial to determining which suspects will go to trial.

UNITED NATIONS, Aug 17, 2007 (AFP) - An international court to try suspects in the 2005 murder of Lebanese former prime minister Rafiq Hariri will be based in the Netherlands, UN officials said Friday.

Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende had written to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon agreeing to host the special court at the United Nations' request, UN spokeswoman Michele Montas said.

ARUSHA, Tanzania, Aug 17, 2007 (AFP) - The UN tribunal for Rwanda on Friday revoked an earlier decision to transfer the case of a key suspect in the African country's 1994 genocide to local courts in the Netherlands.

The tribunal's decision to cancel the April 13 order was accompanied by a new arrest warrant for Michel Bagaragaza, the former head of Rwanda's national tea industry who is accused of involvement in the mass slaughter.

PHNOM PENH, Aug 16, 2007 (AFP) - The United Nations on Thursday voiced concern over a Cambodian judge's resignation from the country's genocide trials, which could delay efforts to try former Khmer Rouge leaders.

You Bunleng, one of the court's co-investigating judges, was appointed head of Cambodia's Appeal Court last week, forcing him to quit the UN-backed tribunal intended to prosecute one of the 20th century's worst atrocities.

He had been seen as key to determining which suspects will go to trial.

THE HAGUE, Aug 16, 2007 (AFP) - The Netherlands plans to host the international court that will try suspects in the murder of Lebanese ex-premier Rafiq Hariri, Dutch Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen told Dutch public Radio 1 Thursday.

'We will react positively' to the request of UN chief Ban Ki-moon to have the tribunal in The Hague, Verhagen said.