Testimony in the nine-month trial of a former prison chief for the Communist Khmer Rouge ended Friday when the defendant unexpectedly asked to be set free despite his repeated admissions of guilt. 'I would ask the chambers to release me,' said the defendant, Kaing Guek Eav, 67, known as Duch, as he addressed the panel officially known as the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia. 'Thank you very much.' The judges took no immediate action. They are expected to render their verdict early next year. The Khmer Rouge caused the deaths of 1.7 million people when it ruled Cambodia from 1975 to 1979, and Duch is the first of five members of the regime to face trial. In a formal statement to the court on Wednesday, Duch said he was 'deeply remorseful and profoundly affected by the destruction on such a mind-boggling scale.' He apologized to the dead, to their families and to all Cambodians. Throughout the trial he has described in detail his role as the commandant of Tuol Sleng prison, also known as S-21, where at least 14,000 people were tortured and sent to their deaths. Almost no one who fell into his hands survived. Duch faces a possible term of life in prison for crimes against humanity and other crimes, but the prosecution asked for a reduced sentence of 40 years because of his cooperation and the five years of unlawful detention he served earlier in a military jail. In a statement this week, Duch said he was only following orders that came down from the Khmer Rouge chief, Pol Pot, who died in 1998 without ever facing trial. 'I could do nothing to help,' Duch said. 'Pol Pot regarded these people as thorns in his eyes.' Duch read his apology from a prepared statement, as he had with a similar apology after the start of the trial in February, and a prosecutor, William Smith, said his partial and qualified admissions throughout the process showed that he was 'not facing up to who he was back in 1975 to 1979.' 'The fact that he entered a request for an acquittal reinforces in our mind that the remorse is limited,' Smith said at a news conference on Friday. 