Ex-Khmer Rouge figure is hospitalized

Prime Minister Hun Sen ordered the emergency hospitalization of a former Khmer Rouge leader Wednesday, amid concern that health and old age would keep another member of Pol Pot’s notorious inner circle from facing justice.

Khieu Samphan, head of state during the Khmer Rouge’s brutal rule over Cambodia in the 1970s, stumbled and passed out while rising from a hammock after a nap Tuesday evening at his home in the northwestern town of Pailin, near the Thai border, his wife said in a telephone interview.

The 76-year-old former leader lost movement in half of his body and was unable to speak, provoking concern that he had suffered a stroke, she said.

The fainting spell came just hours after Khieu Samphan said in an interview that he had little fear of Cambodia’s United Nations-backed genocide tribunal, and repeated assertions that he was not guilty and was unaware of the mass killings attributed to the Khmer Rouge regime.

Although Khieu Samphan’s health reportedly had stabilized by Wednesday, Hun Sen said during a speech at a graduation ceremony that he had ordered a helicopter to airlift Khieu Samphan to a hospital in Phnom Penh, the capital.

“If he dies, people will blame the government,” Hun Sen told the graduates.

A neighbor said Khieu Samphan wished to get treatment in Thailand, but authorities refused his request.

Witnesses said the former leader appeared frail Wednesday as he walked on his own into the hospital under heavy military guard.

French-educated Khieu Samphan, who was for years a top aide to Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot, has been widely named among the the suspects likely to face the tribunal. He has not yet been charged.

“Nothing has been issued by the court regarding him,” court spokesman Peter Foster told Reuters news agency. “His transport to the hospital was organized totally by the government.”

From 1975 to 1979, Khieu Samphan held top leadership positions, including defense minister, in the Khmer Rouge government, which is blamed for the deaths of about 1.7 million Cambodians.

None of the group’s leaders has been put on trial, and several have died since the fall of the regime, including Pol Pot in 1998.

After years of contentious delay, the $56-million tribunal was begun last year. Recent months have seen progress, though many observers are concerned that other aging regime figures might die before facing the court. Trials are expected to begin next year.

Four former Khmer Rouge figures have been arrested and charged by the tribunal.

Like other former leaders, Khieu Samphan has accepted little responsibility for the crimes of the Khmer Rouge, contending that he was mostly secluded during the movement’s time in power and had no knowledge of any atrocities.

“I had no power,” he said Tuesday during an interview in Pailin. He was, he said, “just a symbol, a representative.”