Pol Pot artist weeps at jail horror

One of the few survivors of the Khmer Rouge regime's main torture center wept yesterday as he told Cambodia's war crimes court how he was only spared because he painted propaganda pictures of Pol Pot.

Van Nath described how hunger drove prisoners to eat insects that fell from the ceiling at the communist movement's Tuol Sleng prison, and said he was so famished he dreamed about eating human flesh.

The 63-year-old is the first survivor to testify at the UN-backed trial of jail chief Duch, who is charged with overseeing the torture and extermination of around 15,000 people who passed through the notorious facility.

"The conditions were so inhumane and the food was so little," Van Nath said. "I thought even eating human flesh would be a good thing for me at that moment."

Duch, real name Kaing Guek Eav, slumped in his chair while the former inmate recalled how he was photographed, stripped and then shackled with other prisoners after being taken to Tuol Sleng.

Prisoners had three teaspoons of gruel for each meal and some ate insects, Van Nath said, although he could not as they fell too far from where he was chained.

"I lost my dignity. Even with animals they would give enough food," Van Nath said. "If they (guards) found out we were eating insects we would be beaten, so we could only do it if we avoided being seen by the guards."

Inmates shackled next to him died during his first month and at one point, too weak to walk by himself, he was summoned downstairs and thought his own death was imminent.

But he was instead told to paint a portrait of Pol Pot, the leader of the 1975-1979 regime, whom Van Nath did not recognise.

"I knew that if I did not paint very well, I would be in big trouble. I was so nervous," Van Nath said.

"I only had the feeling that I had to paint very good portraits so that he (Duch) would be happy," Van Nath said. "When he did not show good feelings in his facial expressions, I was scared and anxious."

Guards strung one prisoner up in the yard at Tuol Sleng when he was found to be a poor sculptor, Van Nath added.

Van Nath went on to become one of Cambodia's most famous artists. The court was shown his paintings of torture methods including prisoners being whipped, plunged in water and having their fingernails pulled out with pliers.

"Even though I've tried my best to forget, it still haunts me," Van Nath said. "I never imagined that I would be able to sit in this courtroom today to describe my plight, my experience."

Sketches showed how he was taken from his family and tortured with electricity, while a painting showed Tuol Sleng guards whipping prisoners and seizing their babies.

Earlier in his trial for war crimes and crimes against humanity, Duch, 66, begged forgiveness from victims of the regime after accepting responsibility for running the jail. He faces a life sentence.