Bitter Charges Exchanged by Vietnam, Khmer Rouge

Representatives of Vietnam and the Khmer Rouge, the main battlefield opponents in the 10-year war in Cambodia, showed no hint of compromise Monday as they exchanged bitter charges of torture and genocide during opening-round speeches at the international peace conference on Cambodia.

“The Pol Pot regime,” said Vietnamese Foreign Minister Nguyen Co Thach, referring to the notorious Khmer Rouge leader, “must be totally eliminated just like the fascist regimes in Germany and Italy and the military regime in Japan were eliminated after the Second World War.”

Khmer Rouge representative Khieu Samphan countered: “The Vietnamese crimes, by their scale and atrocity are no less than those committed by the Nazis during the Second World War.”

Demonstrates Gap

The accusations, contained in opening speeches by the two main protagonists, demonstrate the gap that must be closed before an agreement can be reached at the monthlong conference that began here Sunday under the sponsorship of France and Indonesia.

The conference was organized amid widespread fears that a bloody civil war will erupt in Cambodia unless an interim, multi-party government can be established before Vietnam withdraws its estimated 60,000 to 90,000 troops by Sept. 27, as it has promised.

After all the conference participants, including the United States, the Soviet Union and China, had concluded their opening statements Monday, there appeared to be little obvious inclination to compromise among the main parties.

However, former Cambodian leader Prince Norodom Sihanouk, who is favored by most countries as the best interim political leader after the Vietnamese withdrawal, expressed hope for a solution.

“The atmosphere in the conference room is one of optimism. There is a strong current toward a solution,” Sihanouk told reporters.

Sihanouk said the key country in the conference is China, the main military supplier to the Khmer Rouge, the ultra-leftists whose reign of terror gripped Cambodia between 1975 and 1979, when an estimated 1 million people were killed or died of starvation. Well-supplied and disciplined, the Khmer Rouge is still considered to be the most effective fighting force among the four main branches of the resistance.

Any political solution that does not include the Khmer Rouge, Sihanouk and others have warned, would result in the almost certain outbreak of civil war after the Vietnamese troops leave. And the key to gaining the cooperation of the Khmer Rouge, he said, is its Chinese arms supplier.

“China can do a lot. China can choose to stick with the Khmer Rouge. It is for China to decide,” Sihanouk said.

In a speech Monday that was harshly critical of Vietnam, Chinese Foreign Minister Qian Qichen said his country would consider withdrawing its military support for the Khmer Rouge and other Cambodian resistance parties only if there was “a genuine and complete Vietnamese troop withdrawal under international supervision.”

Chinese conditions for the withdrawal, outlined by Qian are severe: “Vietnam should withdraw all its armed forces in Cambodia, including its military advisers, disguised military personnel, armed militia among the Vietnamese immigrants and also all of its weapons, ammunition and other military materiel. None of these should be left behind in Cambodia in any form, nor should they return to Cambodia under any pretext or in any fashion.”