Cambodian strongman seeks arrest of Pol Pot
Khmer Rouge leaders support ousted prince
July 31, 1997
Web posted at: 1:30 p.m. EDT (1730 GMT)PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (CNN) -- Cambodia's new strongman Hun Sen has urged neighboring Thailand to help arrest notorious Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot and bring him before an international tribunal. Meanwhile, Khmer Rouge guerrillas said Thursday they supported the nation's ousted co-premier, Prince Norodom Ranariddh.
Hun Sen made his comments Wednesday in an interview on ABC's "Nightline." He said his two-stage plan called for the Cambodian government to gain control of the Anlong Veng area -- the rebels' main headquarters -- through Khmer Rouge defections and military force.
"I want to send him to an international court," Hun Sen said of Pol Pot. "This is an international problem."
Hun Sen added that Pol Pot's show trial a week ago by comrades who turned against him was political theatrics that has denied justice to Cambodia, which is still suffering from the genocidal rule Pol Pot imposed between 1975 and 1979.
"I think it is a farce, political farce," Hun Sen said. "They took him off in an air-conditioned Landcruiser. It doesn't seem to me that he was under much strain at the time."
Pol Pot was sentenced to house arrest for the rest of his life during the trial, but he was not found guilty of genocide, according to the Thursday edition of the Far Eastern Economic Review.
As many as 2 million Cambodians died during Pol Pot's "killing fields" rule.
Mediating missing set for Saturday
Meanwhile, Cambodia's neighbors announced a new mediating mission Thursday to resolve the crisis from a bloody takeover early this month.
Second Prime Minister Hun Sen toppled First Prime Minister Ranariddh in fighting that was triggered partly over negotiations the prince was holding with the Khmer Rouge.
The takeover shattered the government put in place by U.N.-sponsored elections in 1993 and plunged the country into new instability.
The Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) indefinitely postponed Cambodia's membership in response to the coup. Hun Sen initially rejected ASEAN mediation in the crisis but relented earlier this week.
The foreign ministers of the Philippines, Indonesia and Thailand will meet Hun Sen on Saturday. Domingo Siazon, the foreign secretary of the Philippines, said they would propose that Ranariddh be allowed to return to Cambodia until new elections can be held.
Hun Sen has threatened to arrest the prince if he returns.
Khmer Rouge backs prince
On Thursday, the Far Eastern Economic Review reported that Khmer Rouge leaders sealed an agreement with Ranariddh's royalist party on July 4, the day before fighting that led to Ranariddh's ouster erupted.
Younger Khmer Rouge leaders, who sought to join forces with the royalists and other groups, then purged Pol Pot for his extreme opposition to the move, according to the magazine's correspondent, Nate Thayer, who was permitted to enter the guerrillas' jungle stronghold.
Khmer Rouge radio broadcasts on Thursday also made clear the rebel group's support of the prince. Rebel radio has launched regular attacks on Hun Sen since the prince's ouster.
"We still recognize Prince Norodom Ranariddh as the legal first prime minister of the country," said Khmer Rouge front man Khieu Samphan, one of the main leaders of the rebel faction that broke with Pol Pot.
The Khmer Rouge is now led by a nine-member panel, mostly younger cadres, with Khieu Samphan as the only member from the old guard, Thayer wrote.
One of the reasons the Khmer Rouge wanted to distance themselves from Pol Pot was to attract international support for their efforts to unseat Hun Sen, Thayer said.
Khieu Samphan said his political party, the National Solidarity Party, would join all other groups in opposing Hun Sen and any nominations to replace Ranariddh as co-premier.
Foreign Minister Ung Huot has been nominated for the post and is backed by Hun Sen. He is due to be approved by the Cambodian parliament within days.
Ranariddh has denied any links with the Khmer Rouge, but a senior royalist commander spoke recently of the possibility of striking a military alliance with the guerrillas.
- Message Board: Cambodian Conflict
- Newsmaker Profile: Pol Pot - Cambodian Communist Leader
- Newsmaker Profile: Norodom Sihanouk - Cambodian King
Related stories:
- Burma, Cambodia dominate Southeast Asian talks - July 27, 1997
- ASEAN rejects Cambodian membership - July 23, 1997
- Cambodia's Ranariddh to accept ASEAN peace proposal - July 18, 1997
Related sites:
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- ASEAN - the official website of Association of the Association of South East Asian Nations
- Cambodian Information Center - includies Cambodian news and photos, academic papers on Cambodia, and homepage links
- Embassy of Cambodia - site of the Chancery of the Royal Embassy of Cambodia to the United States located in Washington, D.C.
- Cambodia - profile from CARE
- The Cambodian Genocide Program - presents the Cambodian Genocide Data Base, an archive of bibliographic, biographic, photographic and geographic data
- 1996 Human Rights Report: Cambodia released by the U.S. Department of State on January 30, 1997
- Digital Archive of Cambodian Holocaust Survivors - an ad hoc group of Cambodians and non-Cambodians interested in documenting Cambodian survivor stories on the Internet.
- Beauty and Darkness: Cambodia in Modern History - documents, essays, oral histories, and photos relating to the recent history of Cambodia, with an emphasis on the Khmer Rouge period
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