Barbed wire surrounds the Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

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THE SITUATION

What if you were a photojournalist assigned to document an international news event but it’s organizers denied you and your colleagues full access to the episode’s main stage? How would you work around that obstacle yet show the world what’s happening?

That’s the conundrum that faced photojournalists at the recently concluded trial of former Tuol Sleng S21 Prison Chief Kaing Guek Eav, also known as Duch, held at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. Mr. Kaing Guek Eav was answering charges of “crimes against humanity” related to his role as a Khmer Rouge member during Cambodia’s Pol Pot regime, which lasted from 1975 to 1979.

Peter Maguire, a specialist in international justice and author of “Facing Death in Cambodia” said, “I would put this [trial] under the category of therapeutic legalism.“

PHOTOJOURNALISTS FORCED TO BE CREATIVE

Since photographers and cameramen were not allowed inside the courtroom during the trial, they were forced to snap from outside when the doors swung open.

Here is a look at how photojournalists, including Magnum Photos John Vink, produced photography without access to the theater itself while creatively capturing newsworthy imagery! As you can see from these reports appearing on Ka-set.info…..

they photographed everything from TV monitors to car window reflections. Mr. Vink even took pictures of a cow! As he explained to The Cambodia Daily’s Michelle Vachon, ” I hope that people will perceive that what I photograph is what I can leave to history, but that it will not really be conclusive as a report, as a story of what the trial is.”

As always, your comments are very much appreciated!