Khmer Rouge Reports Sentencing Pol Pot to Life Term

Khmer Rouge guerrillas have sentenced former leader Pol Pot to life imprisonment, the group’s underground radio said Saturday. The radio broadcast from the Khmer Rouge northern base camp, Anlong Veng, said thousands of people had gathered at a public tribunal to denounce Pol Pot’s “genocidal clique.”

“We, the representatives of all the people, the army and cadres, decide to condemn Pol Pot and his clique to life imprisonment,” the broadcast said.

Pol Pot, the mystery-shrouded mastermind of the Khmer Rouge’s reign of terror from 1975-79 that left at least 1 million Cambodians dead, has reportedly been held captive at Anlong Veng by his own former cadres since June. The group ruptured when key guerrilla commanders broke with Pol Pot to negotiate a peace settlement with the government last month.

While both of Cambodia’s top leaders had been quietly courting the much-feared Khmer Rouge, early this month First Prime Minister Prince Norodom Ranariddh won over the commander who claimed to have captured Pol Pot. That new alliance upset the delicate balance of power between the co-premiers. Second Prime Minister Hun Sen, claiming that he was defending Phnom Penh, the capital, from Khmer Rouge defectors brought in to bolster the prince, launched fighting that left Hun Sen in sole control of the country.

Now the future of Cambodia’s three key players is uncertain. Hun Sen maintains tenuous control, Ranariddh is in exile, and Pol Pot may--or may not--be finished.

The underground radio has chronicled the Khmer Rouge’s dissension with Pol Pot, his capture and now the “trial,” but there have been no verified sightings of the enigmatic leader.

That leads some experts to say the latest announcement may be nothing but a Khmer Rouge ruse.

“It’s a step further in the propaganda war,” said Christophe Peschoux, an expert on the group. “The Khmer Rouge wants to draw a blade between the two parties to provoke a rupture and make them go to war with each other.”

Forcing an alliance may be the once-powerful group’s last chance to regain strength; the Khmer Rouge has been weakened by its own fractures and defections. In June, Pol Pot allegedly killed his former defense chief, Son Sen, and his wife for treason.

“We are against Khmer killing Khmer and killing the leaders in our ranks,” guerrilla spokesman Gen. Khan Nun said Friday. “From that day on, the Pol Pot regime was over.” He also denounced Pol Pot for the deaths of 15 government negotiators who were killed after they flew to the Anlong Veng camp for talks with the guerrillas.

Ranariddh and Hun Sen have agreed that Pol Pot should be tried in an international court if he is handed over to the government.