# Authoritative sources — ECCC This reference defines what a citation may be sourced from when writing about the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia. Tier matters; for Court findings, only Tier 1 is authoritative. ## Tier 1 — authoritative Citations to ECCC documents (decisions, judgments, closing orders, indictments, orders, filings) and to the foundational instruments may rest on these sources alone. ### eccc.gov.kh (the Court itself) The official website of the Extraordinary Chambers. Primary source for all Court-issued documents. Key URL patterns: - `https://www.eccc.gov.kh/en/about/legal-framework` — foundational legal framework (UN-Cambodia Agreement, ECCC Law as amended, Internal Rules in all revisions, Addendum 2021) - `https://www.eccc.gov.kh/en/about/jurisprudence` — jurisprudence index with cross-references into the *Guide Vol. 2* - `https://www.eccc.gov.kh/en/lexicon` — official ECCC Lexicon (defined terms used in ECCC proceedings) - `https://www.eccc.gov.kh/en/about/bibliography` — official ECCC bibliographic database of publications about the Court - `https://www.eccc.gov.kh/en/cases/case-[001|002|003|004]` — landing pages for each case - `https://www.eccc.gov.kh/en/cases/case-002/trial-01` and `…/trial-02` — landing pages for Case 002/01 and 002/02 - `https://www.eccc.gov.kh/sites/default/files/documents/courtdoc/[date]/[FilenameWithDocumentNumber].pdf` — direct links to court documents - `https://www.eccc.gov.kh/en/document/legal/internal-rules` — Internal Rules in all revisions - `https://timeline.eccc.gov.kh/` — interactive timeline of ECCC events The site provides English, Khmer (ខ្មែរ), and French versions of most foundational documents. Court decisions are usually available in English; some are also available in French and Khmer. ### The official two-volume Guide to the ECCC The ECCC has published a definitive two-volume reference: - **Volume 1: Establishment, Operations and Cases** — `https://www.eccc.gov.kh/sites/default/files/Guide_to_the_ECCC_Manuscript_EN.pdf`. Institutional and procedural guide covering the establishment, structure, organs (OCP, OCIJ, PTC, TC, SCC, DSS, VSS), and case histories. - **Volume 2: Jurisprudence** — `https://www.eccc.gov.kh/sites/default/files/Guide_to_the_ECCC_Volume_2_advance_copy.pdf` (or `https://eccc.gov.kh/sites/default/files/Guide_Vol_2_Manuscript_EN_latest.pdf`). Comprehensive jurisprudence catalogue organised in eight chapters: Jurisdiction; Crimes; Individual criminal responsibility; Fair trial rights; Procedure; Sentencing; Civil Party action; Administration of justice. Both volumes are Tier 1 (Court-issued). Volume 2 is the canonical map of ECCC jurisprudence. **Use it to locate the relevant Chamber, decision, and paragraph; then verify the underlying decision directly** through the workflow in `verification-workflow.md`. The Guide entry tells you where to look; the verified Chamber text is the citation. ### ECCC Practice Directions Practice Directions issued by the Court govern operational matters. They are Tier 1 (Court-issued) and citable as such. The three principal Practice Directions are: - **Practice Direction on the Filing of Documents before the ECCC** — ECCC/01/2007/Rev. 8, as revised on 7 March 2012 - **Practice Direction on Victim Participation** — 02/2007/Rev. 1, as revised on 27 October 2008 - **Practice Direction on Protective Measures** — ECCC/03/2007/Rev. 1, as revised on 29 April 2008 Practice Directions are available via `https://www.eccc.gov.kh/en/about/legal-framework`. When citing, give the full PD reference (number and revision date). ### archive.eccc.gov.kh — the ECCC Archive The official repository of ECCC court records: over 2 million pages of legally and historically significant documents in Khmer, English and French. The Archive is part of the Court's residual mandate following the Addendum (December 2021) and the commencement of the residual phase on 1 January 2023. ### legal-tools.org The ICC Legal Tools Database, maintained by the Office of the Prosecutor of the ICC together with partner organisations. Hosts ECCC documents alongside ICC and other tribunals. Useful when eccc.gov.kh is slow, blocked, or returns a 403. Document numbers and metadata on legal-tools.org should match eccc.gov.kh; where they diverge, the eccc.gov.kh version controls. ## Tier 2 — secondary (must be labelled when used) These sources host or summarise ECCC documents but are not the issuing authority. Citable for context, journalism, and academic analysis. Never authoritative on the Court's own findings; the underlying Court document, found on Tier 1, is. - **OHCHR Cambodia** — `https://cambodia.ohchr.org/en/rule-of-law/eccc-decisions` — curated compilation of ECCC decisions with brief descriptions. Useful for triage; verify the underlying document on Tier 1. - **Cambodia Annotated Code of Criminal Procedure** (2nd ed., December 2015, English and Khmer) — `https://cambodia.ohchr.org/en/rule-of-law/cambodia-annotated-code-criminal-procedure`. Annotates the Cambodian Code of Criminal Procedure using ECCC jurisprudence, UN Human Rights Committee, European Court of Human Rights, and French Court of Cassation decisions. Authoritative for how the ECCC's procedural rulings relate to the Cambodian Code. Tier 2 only because it is a derivative work; the underlying decisions remain Tier 1. - **UN Rule of Law** — `https://www.un.org/ruleoflaw/` — hosts some ECCC judgments (e.g. Duch 2010) alongside other international tribunal documents. - **Cambodia Tribunal Monitor** — `https://www.cambodiatribunal.org/` — trial-monitoring archive maintained by a consortium including Northwestern University School of Law's Center for International Human Rights. - **Documentation Center of Cambodia (DC-Cam)** — `https://dccam.org/` — independent research institute with substantial primary-source archives, especially on Tuol Sleng (S-21) and the Khmer Rouge period. - **John D. Ciorciari & Anne Heindel, *Hybrid Justice: The Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia*** (University of Michigan Press, 2014; open access). Definitive scholarly treatment of the ECCC from legal and political perspectives. - **Nina H.B. Jørgensen, *The Elgar Companion to the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia*** (Edward Elgar, 2018). Written by a former senior adviser in the ECCC's Pre-Trial and Supreme Court Chambers. - **Academic journals** — Journal of International Criminal Justice, International Review of the Red Cross, Cambridge Core International Legal Materials, Asia-Pacific Journal on Human Rights and the Law. Useful for doctrinal analysis. Never authoritative on the Court's holdings. - **Refworld / UNHCR** — `https://www.refworld.org/` — hosts ECCC documents in its International Criminal Tribunals collection. When a Tier 2 source is the only available source for a proposition, the output must say so. Example: *"As summarised by Cambodia Tribunal Monitor (Tier 2; the underlying decision E163/5 was not retrievable in this session)…"* ## Never authoritative - Wikipedia - Blog posts (unless the author is the Court itself or a Judge of the Court writing in an official capacity, which is rare and labelled as such) - Social media - AI-generated summaries (including from this skill's outputs — a verified citation in a prior session is not a citation in this session unless re-verified) - News aggregators reporting on ECCC matters second-hand ## Khmer-language sources For propositions that depend on the Cambodian-law components of the ECCC's jurisdiction (the 1956 Penal Code; the ECCC Establishment Law in its original Khmer), the Khmer-language version on eccc.gov.kh is the controlling text. The English versions are translations. Where the question is whether a Cambodian-law concept is or is not captured in an ECCC provision, the analysis cannot rest on the English translation alone; the output should flag the dependence on Khmer text and recommend verification by a Khmer reader. ## When everything fails If, after working the fallback ladder in `verification-workflow.md`, a citation cannot be verified at any tier, the citation comes out. Do not invent. Do not paraphrase the proposition while keeping a fabricated reference. Either narrow the claim to what can be supported, or tell the user that the source could not be retrieved and ask them to provide a URL or copy of the document.