T V - February 17, 2009; Khmer Rouge Trial Opens

The U.N.-backed trial of the chief Khmer Rouge torturer has started, three decades after the fall of the Pol Pot regime, blamed for 1.7 million deaths in Cambodia.

Kaing Guek Eav, better known as Duch, is charged with war crimes, torture and murder for his role as head of a notorious prison where more than 14,000 people were tortured and executed during the Khmer Rouge's reign of terror in the 1970s.

Hundreds of survivors of Cambodia's Killing Fields queued for hours to attend the hearing, which finally begins after a decade of delays and wrangling.