Hanoi to Cut Cambodia Force by 50,000

Vietnam announced Thursday that it will withdraw 50,000 troops from Cambodia this year and place its remaining forces under Cambodian command in a move hailed by the Soviet Union, the Communist country’s chief ally.

In Hanoi, the Vietnamese Foreign and Defense ministries said in a communique broadcast over state-run Radio Hanoi that “the Socialist Republic of Vietnam and the People’s Republic of Kampuchea (Cambodia) have agreed to withdraw 50,000 army volunteers in 1988.”

In Moscow, the Soviet government praised the Vietnamese decision and said it hopes the troop withdrawal will improve Sino-Soviet relations.

China has set three conditions for normal relations with Moscow--a withdrawal from Afghanistan, an end to Vietnam’s occupation of Cambodia and the removal of Soviet troops along the Sino-Soviet border.

See Link to Summit

Diplomats said the timing of the announcement in Hanoi and the immediate news conference in Moscow--along with the Soviets’ disclosure in recent days of their own troop levels and casualties in Afghanistan--represent an attempt to clear the air on regional issues before President Reagan’s arrival in Moscow Sunday for his fourth summit with Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev.

A U.S. spokesman in Bangkok greeted the announcement coolly, saying Vietnam should withdraw all of its forces from Cambodia. The United States estimates there are 120,000 Vietnamese troops in Cambodia. Vietnam puts the total at less than 100,000.

The communique, received in Bangkok, said, “The withdrawal of this large component of the Vietnamese army volunteers will be carried out from June to December, 1988, in several directions and on land routes and on waterways.”

It said the command of the Soviet-supplied Vietnamese army, which has occupied Cambodia since invading its western neighbor Christmas Day, 1978, will also be withdrawn and remaining Vietnamese troops will be “placed under the guidance” of Cambodia.

The communique reiterated earlier pledges by Vietnam to pull all its troops out of Cambodia by the end of 1990.

The same communique was released simultaneously in the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh.

Moscow Supports Move

“The Soviet Union fully supports the new, constructive initiatives launched by the governments of Vietnam and Kampuchea today,” Soviet Deputy Foreign Minister Igor A. Rogachev told a news conference in Moscow.

He said the Soviets had not put pressure on their Vietnamese allies to withdraw their troops from Cambodia.

Vietnam invaded Cambodia on Dec. 25, 1978, capturing the capital of Phnom Penh in two weeks and ending a three-year reign of terror, torture and death by the Khmer Rouge in which more than 1 million Cambodians died.

The brutal Khmer Rouge, which maintains about 35,000 Chinese-armed fighters along the Thai-Cambodian border, is the most powerful faction in the U.N.-sanctioned three-party resistance coalition led by Prince Norodom Sihanouk.

Vietnam, saddled with a Western trade embargo, a bankrupt economy and, more recently, famine, has vowed to withdraw all its troops from Cambodia by the end of 1990 and leave the country’s pro-Hanoi government in place.