From pestilence to ... well ... more pestilence, I suppose, with many reports on what is being called the beginning of the Khmer Rouge trials.

Thirty years after the fact, someone has finally been charged with crimes against humanity and is to face the judges of the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia.

It's Kaing Guek Eav, of course, the infamous "Duch", head of Tuol Sleng prison, S21, the nerve center of torture for the Khmer Rouge where more than 16,000 men, women and children suffered unimaginable horror and suffering before being taken into the countryside and executed.

Unlike the rest of the monsters who have been living life as if they had little to worry about and no conscience whatsoever, Duch has been in custody since 1999. His lawyer takes the inevitable "He was only following orders" stance, saying Duch had "no rights to arrest or kill anyone", a line that makes me physically ill.

Even all these years later, as anyone who's been there will attest, the suffering of the thousands who were forced to enter the place is still palpable in those buildings now known as the Genocide Museum. Only seven people survived. Seven. And photos of many of those that didn't line the walls of some of the bigger rooms of Toul Sleng, all with eyes already near dead, and it's chillingly obvious that even the small children completely grasped the horror of their reality.

The Christian Science Monitor takes a comprehensive look at the present circumstances surrounding the tribunal that is well worth a read ... not a comfortable read, but thorough.

Quoting Youk Chhang, the director of the Documentation Center of Cambodia -- an incredible resource that provides hours ... days, weeks, months ... of reading on the KR years -- saying that Duch was "... the middle person, the joint" of the genocide operation, the vital link between the murders on the ground and the top leadership of the regime, the CSM article addresses both Duch's attempts at blame-shifting and his acceptance of his roll in the killings.

The Economist is taking a "Better late than never" tact, and although that has a certain ring to it, it doesn't seem to convey the urgency involved as perpetrators age and die off without giving any satisfaction to survivors.

It's been more than ten years since Cambodia asked the UN for help in setting up a special court to try those accused of being instrumental in the murder of two million people. Ten years and $56 million, and the action so far is one old man being moved from one cell to another.