Deathwatch:Cambodia…The NEVER AGAIN lesson of Viet’s calculated 500 hundred year genocidal war on Khmer race

April 3, 2011
Op-Ed By Kok Sap
Originally posted at: http://khamerlogue.wordpress.com/

Deathwatch remains after 32 year of Viet installed regime replacing Pol Pot, the self determined and governed independent revolutionary who challenged Ho Chi Minh of his Indochina Federation doctrine

[Note: Heng Samrin regime's foreign minister,Hun Sen, had no knowledge what was the U.N.O and what's it doing? He asked for an explanation from a foreign AID worker who tried to persuade him to accept the requests in bringing food and medicine to save the starved Khmers who lived under Yuon guns in the cities and country. His ignorance did not help Cambodia to be perceived as a competent country in the world view that was the same as France did back in the era of its occupation. Was he not only uneducated but too ignorant to understand Le Duc Tho's anger against his boss Pen Sovann who shared view with Pol Pot to resist Yuon intent to colonize Khmers. People still see the ignorants were put to lead Cambodia to advance and bow to Yuons' dictation and advantage until now.

In re-reading this article, there's much to say and learn from the past mistakes that Khmer revolutionaries and Kings mistook Viets calculated colonial plots, as the ten thousands of year of friendship to defend and keep Khmer land from colonialists. In December 1978 Viets showed their true color and real intent behind their fronted war against the Imperialists by invading and occupying Cambodia. On 7 January 1979,the Viets declared themselves as the bravados who saved Khmers from the extinction from the very Ho Chi Minh revenge on Pol Pot refusal to submit to the Indochina Communist Party pledges and domination. Then the drama of Khmers killed Khmers were unravelled to the world press corp by the Hanoi propagandist who was sent into Cambodia with the invading forces. The Communist Khmers tribunal was a planned stunt of the monkey that stole and ate farmer's rice then planting few grains on the naive goat's goaty.This plot was made and well engineered by the same Hanoi Politbureau to forbid the puppet regime from educating the youngs about the real agendas of the 7 January victory.

In merely less than 300 years,Khmer race and land were slowly absorbed by the conniving tribal ethnics who were much despised and hated by the Qin Empire. After much involvements and observations on how Ho Chi Minh manipulated and blackmailed Khmer revolutionaries to help him fighting the French occupation and colonization of Indochina and Lowland Khmer territory,a handful of Khmer patriots included Khieu Samphan-Pol Pot who could see and grasp the Viets thousand years colonization and eradication of Khmer race plan. In his 2nd book published in 2007,"The Analysis of Cambodia history from the beginning upto the Democratic Kampuchea," Khieu Samphan credited Saloth Sar known as Pol Pot who was the awaken one who could put Viets to notice that the Khmer patriotism and self determined revolution disallowing Yuon to dictate Khmer race and history when the Kampuchea Communist Party declared its independence from Yuon Indo China Communist Party in 1960.From that day on,Ho's disciples deviced new plots and ploys to lure Khmers into their traps and tricks into an open war in March 1970. Afterward,Khmer race suffered the worst tragedy in the century that was perpetrated by the same Ho Chi Minh's Indochina Union doctrine since 1930.) ]

TIME published 12 November 1979:

It is a country soaked in blood, devastated by war, and its people are starving to death. Every day numbed witnesses to the appalling tragedy that has consumed Cambodia trek across the border into Thailand. Stumbling on reed-thin legs through the high elephant grass that grows along the frontier, they form a grisly cavalcade of specters, wrapped in black rags. Many are in the last stages of malnutrition, or are ravaged by such diseases as dysentery, tuberculosis and malaria. Perhaps the most pathetic images of all are those of tearful, exhausted mothers cradling hollow-eyed children with death’s-head faces, their bellies swollen, their limbs as thin and fragile as dried twigs. Since early October, an estimated 80,000 Cambodians have made it safely across the border, and perhaps 250,000 others are clustered in the western provinces of the country, waiting for their chance to escape. They are the lucky ones. Relief agencies believe that as many as 2.25 million Cambodians could die of starvation in the next few months unless a vast amount of aid is provided soon.

Cambodia's former King Norodom Sihanouk dies at 89

Associated Press/Andy Eames, File - In this Oct. 20, 2004 file photo, Cambodia's King Norodom Sihanouk and Queen Monineath wave at Phnom Penh airport, in Cambodia. Sihanouk, the former Cambodian king …more who was never far from the center of his country's politics through a half-century of war, genocide and upheaval, died of natural causes early Monday, Oct. 15, 2012, in Beijing. He was 89. (AP Photo/Andy Eames, File)

A Cambodian family members ride on a motorbike as they head back from their home village, passing by portraits of former King Norodom Sihanouk, left, and his wife Queen Monineath, Monday, Oct.15, 2012, at the outskirt of Phnom Penh, Cambodia. Sihanouk, the revered former king who was a towering figure in Cambodian politics through a half-century of war, genocide and upheaval, died Monday. He was 89. (AP Photo/Heng Sinith

FILE - In this Sept. 2, 2006 file photo, Cambodia's retired King Norodom Sihanouk greets well-wishers before departing for China from Phnom Penh International Airport, in Cambodia. Sihanouk, the former Cambodian king who was never far from the center of his country's politics through a half-century of war, genocide and upheaval, has died. He was 89. (AP Photo/Heng Sinith, File)

A Cambodian woman prays in tears in front of the main gate of the Royal Palace in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, to mourn the death of former King Norodom Sihanouk Monday, Oct. 15, 2012. Sihanouk, the revered former king who was a towering figure in Cambodian politics through a half-century of war, genocide and upheaval, died Monday. He was 89. (AP Photo/Heng Sinith)

Two girls pray outside the gate of the Royal Palace in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, after the death of former King Norodom Sihanouk, Monday, Oct. 15, 2012. Sihanouk died of a heart attack Monday in Beijing, where he had been receiving medical treatment since January for a variety of ailments. He was 89. (AP Photo)

Monks from Takeo province, southwestern Cambodia, pray outside the gate of the Royal Palace in Phnom Penh after the death of former King Norodom Sihanouk, Monday, Oct. 15, 2012. Sihanouk died of a heart attack Monday in Beijing, where he had been receiving medical treatment since January for a variety of ailments. He was 89. (AP Photo)

Journalists film a convoy of cars following Norodom Monineath Sihanouk, wife of former Cambodian King Norodom Sihanouk, arrive at a hospital where the king received treatment, in Beijing Monday, Oct. 15, 2012. Sihanouk, the revered former king who was a towering figure in Cambodian politics through a half-century of war, genocide and upheaval, died Monday in Beijing. He was 89. He had been getting medical treatment in China since January and had suffered a variety of illnesses, including colon cancer, diabetes and hypertension. (AP Photo/Andy Wong)

Lary, 27, cries as he joins others mourning the death of the late former Cambodian King Norodom Sihanouk in front of the Royal Palace in Phnom Penh October 15, 2012. Norodom Sihanouk, once an absolute ruler who freed Cambodia from colonialism before becoming a tragic pawn through decades of turmoil, died on Monday in a Beijing hospital. He was 89. REUTERS/Damir Sagolj

People wearing white pray as they mourn the late former Cambodian King Norodom Sihanouk in front of the Royal Palace in Phnom Penh October 15, 2012. Norodom Sihanouk, once an absolute ruler who freed Cambodia from colonialism before becoming a tragic pawn through decades of turmoil, died on Monday in a Beijing hospital. He was 89. REUTERS/Damir Sagolj

People wearing white pray as they mourn the late former Cambodian King Norodom Sihanouk in front of the Royal Palace in Phnom Penh October 15, 2012. Norodom Sihanouk, once an absolute ruler who freed Cambodia from colonialism before becoming a tragic pawn through decades of turmoil, died on Monday in a Beijing hospital. He was 89. REUTERS/Damir Sagolj

A woman cries as people gather to mourn the late former Cambodian King Norodom Sihanouk in front of the Royal Palace in Phnom Penh October 15, 2012. Norodom Sihanouk, once an absolute ruler who freed Cambodia from colonialism before becoming a tragic pawn through decades of turmoil, died on Monday in a Beijing hospital. He was 89. REUTERS/Damir Sagolj

By SOPHENG CHEANG
Associated Press – 10/15/2012

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (AP) — He was many things to the Cambodia he helped navigate through half a century of war and genocide — revered independence hero, ruthless monarch and prime minister, communist collaborator, eccentric playboy, avid filmmaker.

Most of all, perhaps, Cambodia's former King Norodom Sihanouk was a cunning political survivor who reinvented himself repeatedly throughout his often flamboyant life.

On Monday, aged 89, Sihanouk died of a heart attack in Beijing, where he had been receiving medical treatment since January for a variety of ailments.

First crowned king by the French in 1941 at the age of 18, Sihanouk saw his Southeast Asian nation transformed from colony to kingdom, from U.S.-backed regime to U.S. bombing zone, from Khmer Rouge killing field to what it remains today — a fragile experiment in democracy.

Language and National Identity: Cambodia (by Steve Heder) - Colonialism

Language and National Identity in Asia
Edited by Andrew Simpson
Oxford University Press, 2007

Chapter 13: CAMBODIA
by Dr. Steve Heder

13.3 Colonialism, Language, Nationalism, and Political Division, 1863-1953

Given the adverse geo-economic and geo-political circumstances Krong Kampucheatheupatai faced, some personalities in the elite opted in 1863 to accept French protection for their position and the kingdom. They came from the most 'Siamese' circles of the royal family, those elements associated with Hue having been eliminated. The Protectorate resulted in a deal for joint French-royal administration with its capital at Phnom Penh, a system which the French gradually subverted to the disadvantage of the traditional elite and developed further with a neo-traditional bilingual elite created from collaborative royals, aristocrats, nobles, interpreters, and hangers on (Tully 2002). The French recognized that a key part of their protectorate project was to transform the Siamese-educated, multilingual Kampuchean monarch from a petty kinglet whose royal ideology required him to be an exemplar of universal cosmic-religious ideals into 'the living incarnation, the august and supreme personification' of Cambodian 'nation­ality' (Aymonier 1900-1904: 56). However, the French also treated the Royaume du Cambodge as a backwater in a colonial construct that combined it with Vietnam (divided north to south into Tonkin, Annam, and Cochinchina) and Laos under the overarching administrative structure of Indochina, investing much less in the development of Cambodia than Vietnam. It was thus relatively untouched by the capitalist transform­ations and bureaucratic state-building that more quickly and solidly forged incipiently anti-colonial nation-states in Vietnam and elsewhere in Southeast Asia, even where the raw material was more multi-ethnic and economically less advanced (Dixon 1991).

Meanwhile, the Angkorian temples were portrayed in colonial historiography as evidence that, since the fourteenth century, the Khmer and Cambodia had suffered some extraordinary catastrophe that proved they were either doomed to disappearance or needed rescuing and restoration to avoid extinction. A few French believed their colonialism should finish off the failed Cambodian state and incorporate it into the direct French colony of Cochinchina in southern Vietnam. For many others, French colonialism was seen to be the potential saviour (Edwards 1999).

With both visions in the background, the French imported and employed many Vietnamese to work in the civil service in Cambodia. Accompanied by an influx of Vietnamese artisans, traders, and casual labourers, their numbers rose to perhaps 200,000 in the mid-1930s. Some of these Vietnamese began to see France's Indochina project as compatible with Vietnamese domination of Cambodia, raising the prospect of a relaunching of Dai Nam's annexation project. Meanwhile, Vietnamese vocabulary began to seep into Khmer, joining numerous Chinese terms in common usage. However, while Khmer-Chinese intermarriage continued, such liaisons remained rare between Khmer and Vietnamese. Indeed, while the level of anti-Chinese animosity, popular and elite, was lower than perhaps anywhere else in Southeast Asia, anti-Viet­namese feeling seems to have undergone intensification.

Within the boundaries of Cambodia as frozen by French colonialism during the first half-century of its Protectorate, Khmer was spoken quite uniformly. Although local accents existed, the differences were not so great as to generate any recognizable regionalism. Beyond Cambodia's borders, among Khmer who had been living under non-Khmer rule, differences were larger. Speakers of what came to be known as 'Khmer Kandal' (Khmer in the middle, within Cambodia itself) might have difficulty understanding some of the speech of 'Khmer Kraom' ('lowland' or 'downriver' Khmer) living in Vietnamese Cochinchina, and more problems conversing with residents of border areas in Siam/Thailand, who referred to themselves as 'Khmer Loe' (upland Khmer).

The opportunity for promoting national unity on the basis of traditional Khmer texts was not grasped by the French, whose general attitude toward Khmer literature was dismissive. The capacity for reading and writing sophisticated Khmer literary works, already confined to a tiny elite, declined rapidly under the French, creating a cultural rupture with the past (Nepote and Khing 1981). Thus, at the end of the nineteenth century, very little was being written or recorded and virtually nothing printed in Khmer. Religious and other palm-leaf manuscripts were still produced, many in Khmer but mostly in Pali, and printed materials circulated, but more in French, Vietnamese, and Chinese than in Khmer. Young Buddhist monks still learned the basics of reading and writing Khmer as part of their pagoda studies, but Cambodia as a whole suffered from having less functional literacy in the main local language than probably any other country in mainland Southeast Asia, such a situation extending well into the twentieth century.

Yet, out of all this grew the embryonic imaginings of a nation - which happened more slowly and later than in most of Asia, but happened nevertheless. The crucial shift came in the early twentieth century and gathered pace in the 1920s and 1930s. The growth of a secular elite, colonial patronage of reformist elements in the Buddhist monkhood, the gradual expansion of colonial schools, and the introduction of Khmer print production facilitated the emergence and popularization of a high culture intended for the masses and presented to them as their national culture. This process, however, began in French and was carried forward by French administrators in dialogue with Francophone Khmer. Together, they formulated the concepts of a Khmer or Cambodian 'nation', 'soul', 'national character', and 'race', whose place in the world was often defined with reference to the need to catch up intellectually, administratively, economically, and otherwise with Siam and Cochinchina. Those involved in such nationalist promotion produced printed French and Khmer texts intended to tell Cambodians who they were historically and how they could become better Khmer in the future by being more like the Khmer of yore, but simultaneously becoming modern, thus making it possible to restore past glories in new ways. They saw the vernacularization of Khmer as part of this nation-saving and nation-building project, and this was intended to give Cambodia's nationalism what they called a 'national language' and thus a linguistic dimension cordoning it off from Laos, Thailand, and Vietnam, although French remained the prime language of government and indeed of nationalist thought. Presiding over all this was King Sisowath, who although not highly proficient in French was in other ways 'almost a Frenchman' (Tully 2002: 135). At the same time, he saw himself as a pious Buddhist, and was thus a culturally hybrid embodiment of the emerging nation.

The establishment during the mid-1930s of Cambodia's first, Francophone lycee, named after King Sisowath, was crucial in reorienting its formative generation of modern intellectuals away from any possibility of seeing themselves as Indochinese and towards considering themselves as the leaders in creating a predominantly Khmer Cambodian nation. The French-founded, Cambodian-staffed Buddhist Institute had the same institutional effect vis-a-vis the Cambodian monkhood, presiding over the pinnacle of Buddhist/Pali schooling that promoted remaking Buddhism as modern and Khmer.

However, while some French colonial officials were fervently promoting 'Khmeritude', opening doors for officially approved expressions of Khmer culture, they practised intellectual repression more severe than in other parts of Indochina. Thus, it is not surprising that the first overtly political Khmer-language newspapers, maga­zines, and novels only appeared in the 1930s alongside the tardy beginnings of an organized nationalist movement, whose first leaders were graduates of Lycee Sisowath and staff of the Buddhist Institute (Tully 2002). The founding figures included Son Ngoc Thanh, a Vietnamese-Khmer Kraom metis, and other Khmer Kraom or Sino-Khmer Kraom. The inventiveness of Khmer nationalism is well exemplified by the background of the former: despite his 'racial' and cultural hybridity, Son Ngoc Thanh presented himself as more Khmer than the Khmer, someone who knew politically 'more about what it means to be a Khmer than . . . Khmer born in Khmer-land' (Nagaravatta, 1937). Similarly, the new Khmer literature that emerged from this time reflected a culture that was socially more rooted in the cosmopolitan Mekong delta, with its Chinese, Vietnamese, and French influences, than the Angkorian realms that it celebrated as the heartland of Khmerness (Nepote and Khing 1981).

This is the paradoxical context in which Cambodian proto-nationalists made one of their key objectives the 'Khmerization' of the civil service, and above all the displacement of Vietnamese officials, the latter move being part of a larger process whereby Cambodian nationalism formatively defined Vietnamese as a main Other and denied the possibility that a Vietnamese could also be a Kampuchean (Leonard 1995).

The flagship publication of this movement was the newspaper Nagaravatta (i.e. Nokor Voat or Angkor Wat). With the encouragement of some French believers in Khmeritude, Nagaravatta was able to attack Vietnamese and Chinese 'domination' of the civil service and economy, respectively, although Nagaravatta also advocated studying things Vietnamese and Chinese in realms other than language and religion, using what was learned to catch up with other nations (Edwards 1999). The writers of Nagaravatta stressed the need to use Khmer to spread Khmerism among the Khmer, and called for the use of Khmer in education and in official documents. This furthermore coincided with the beginnings of the coinage of neologisms, translating French terms into Khmer as an intended aid to the spread of Khmer through more formal domains of language use. Much of the translation/coinage work was carried out by Buddhist scholars quadrilingual in French, Sanskrit, Pali, and Khmer, and the unfortunate end result was that many of the new vocabulary items turned out to be Pali-Sanskrit jawbreakers, unintelligible to virtually everyone in Cambodia except those who formulated them.

This difficulty was exacerbated by the tiny circulation of print media, as a result of which most people in the countryside simply never encountered the new vocabulary items. Even in urban areas, the neologisms were in fact little used, and those few members of the elite who were familiar with them often preferred to employ the original French expressions. Nevertheless, Khmer print media helped form a new generation of urban students and other readers coming of age as World War II loomed. The French colonial view that only reform could save Cambodia from extinction was recast by these new Cambodians into redemptionist nationalist projects, according to which Khmer/Cambodians themselves would prevent the final demise of the Khmer and Cambodia and relaunch the Cambodians as the people of a glorious nation-state. Importantly, however, the new generation was also politically divided. Most palace and aristocratic youth, including the future King Norodom Sihanouk, saw the Cambodian nation as intrinsically royal and requiring significant Francophonia. They were at odds with those - influenced by the likes of Son Ngoc Thanh - who came to insist it must be anti-colonial, and probably republican, democratic, or socialist.

The divergent streams of Cambodian nationalism emerging in the early 1940s were encouraged by Japanese forces that had established bases in Indochina in 1941, provoked by a fascist turn in French colonial policies and fanned by rumours of French plans to rationalize the increasing use of Khmer by Romanizing it, like the vernacular Vietnam­ese. This brought to the fore the inherent contradiction of French involvement in promotion of the Cambodian nation, which the nationalist elite in Phnom Penh saw as robbing the nation of its history and language. The nationalist opposition faced violence in 1942, when French police attacked a protest against the arrest of a monk accused of plotting a nationalist putsch, a demonstration in which other Buddhist clergy played a prominent role. Several leading monks and nationalists were arrested, and others fled to the countryside or abroad.

Several years later, following the end of World War II, nationalist activists success­fully pressed Sihanouk and the French to institute a constitutional monarchy and parliamentary democracy, and themselves formed the new Democrat Party. To the surprise of both Sihanouk and the French, the Democrats then managed to win a series of elections and used parliament as a platform to demand more rapid Khmerization of the bureaucracy, military, and police, that is, the replacement of Vietnamese, French, and aging aristocratic officials with Cambodians of their generation educated in French, as part of a drive for accelerated progress towards full independence. On the other hand, full-fledged linguistic Khmerization was not a burning issue for the Democrat national­ists, not least because their claim to political leadership rested on their status as intellectuals, as proven by their French-language education. Still, this group did show a concern to raise the standard of the Khmer spoken by the Cambodian elite and some wanted to rationalize and popularize (i.e. de-Sanskritize and de-Pali-ize) the language to facilitate this.

In another contemporaneous development, many of the protestors who had fled to Thailand after the demonstrations of 1942 became 'Khmer Issarak' ('Emancipated' or Free Khmer). This phrase, originally coined by Thai irredentists influenced by Siamese ideas of political freedom, promoted the concept of simultaneous liberation of Khmer from the yoke of White colonialism and from retrograde feudalism. The anti-French, anti-royalist Khmer Issarak movement was launched with covert Thai support and supplemented by assistance and behind-the-scenes direction from Vietnamese commun­ists. It was also backed by a significant number of Vietnamese troops. The three Sino-Khmer Kraom who fronted the organization were Son Ngoc Minh, Tou Samut, and Siev Heng. None of these three spoke French, but all spoke Khmer and Vietnamese, and both Minh and especially Samut were literate in Pali. Led by Samut, they created a new communist Khmer language, translating basic Soviet and Maoist terms into Khmer. Like the neologism-makers in Phnom Penh, they often used Pali or Sanskrit in the coining of Khmer communist terminology. Influenced by Cambodians exposed to Thai Marxism, they also incorporated some Thai-isms into their political lingo. However, they relied much more than those in Phnom Penh on attempts to find colloquial Khmer equivalents for Vietnamese words and tried much harder to avoid unpronounceable and arcane polysyllabic Pali-Sanskritisms, while purging the language of royalisms and other terms marking social hierarchy among speakers. The resulting revolutionary parlance was quite accessible to peasant speakers of Khmer and was popularized with surprising ease and rapidity. In communist-controlled areas of the countryside in what these Issarak officially called 'Nokor Khmaer' (rendered 'Khmeria' in French), a political dialect of Khmer thus became current. The dialect was spread through the publication of communist Issarak periodicals.

Whether this new language qualified as a nationalist one is problematic, because despite every attempt by the Vietnamese and Khmer Kraom ICP members to deny it, the movement they led was under ultimate Vietnamese direction. Once again, there was a profound contradiction in foreign promotion of a Khmer nation. This time, by introducing and popularizing Khmer national-communist rhetoric, the Vietnamese provided the linguistic vehicle through which Cambodian revolutionaries and radicals could demand full national independence, and such demands soon began to be whispered in Khmer by some in the Cambodian Communist ranks, behind the backs of the Vietnamese (Heder 2004).

A third competing political dialect of Khmer that arose at this time was associated with the republican-leaning 'Populo-Movement' (pracheachalana). Like Communist Khmer, it was largely purged of royalisms, but maintained other linguistic markers differentiating persons of high from lower social status. It also maintained most of the elite neologisms coined in Phnom Penh, but had some of its own distinct political terminology.

Thus, political geography came to determine the words that Cambodians would use to signify parallel concepts. For the Franco-aristocratic elite, 'the people', for example, were the pracheareas or simply the reas, that is, 'the subjects', while for the communist Issarak, they were the pracheachun, the simplest formulation for 'people', and for the republicans, they were pracheapularoat, or 'popular citizens'. In the countryside, peasants became adept at using one word or the other to indicate which warring political side they were on. So, too, did intellectuals who were exposed to all three dialects.

Quite generally, popular acceptance of a Vietnamese-led Khmer communism and the development of rural pockets of communist and anti-communist Issarak-speak reflected the weakness and incoherence of Cambodian nationalism, which in turn was at least in part a result of the continuing lack of nationally penetrative, Phnom Penh-based Khmer- language media. Circulation of Khmer-language newspapers and magazines remained very low - some 3,000 copies for a population of around five million - and was even outnumbered by Chinese publications. The 'national' radio station could not be heard in outlying areas and included much French-language programming, and personal radio receivers numbered only in the thousands, making the audience extremely limited. The situation with regard to education was hardly any better. According to probably opti­mistic statistics, a quarter of boys and half that proportion of girls attended primary classes, and these often only finished three elementary years of Khmer-language educa­tion, so functional literacy no doubt soon disappeared. For those few Khmer students who went beyond the third year, French was still the predominant medium. Outside of education, French and Chinese remained the default languages of adminis­tration and business, respectively, alongside Vietnamese.

Language and National Identity in Asia: Cambodia - Pre-colonial History: Before, During, and After the Angkorian Period

Mam Sonando arrested on Sunday morning [... under trumped up charges]

15 July 2012
By Sok Pheakdey
Cambodian Express News
Translated from Khmer by KI-Media

Phnom Penh – Cops dressed in civilian and in uniform clothes came to the house of Mam Sonando, which also serves as the office of the Beehive radio station located in Thnot Chrum village, Boeung Tompun commune, Meanchey district, Phnom Penh, to arrest him. Mam Sonando is also the president of the Democrat Association and owner of the Beehive 105 FM radio station. According to Mrs. Din Phanara, Mam Sonando’s wife, the arrest was made at 9AM on Sunday 15 July 2012.

Din Phanara indicated that when the cops came to arrest Mam Sonando at home, they read to him the court order issued by the Phnom Penh municipal court which accused Mam Sonando of involvement with land dispute in Kratie province.

As of this morning, the cops took Mam Sonando from his home to the Phnom Penh police headquarters for questioning.

Mam Sonando arrived in Phnom Penh on 10 PM on 12 July 2012, following his visit in the US. He was not arrested at his arrival at the Phnom Penh airport where he was greeted by family members and members of the Democrat Association. At that time, civil society organizations and reporters were closely observing his arrival in Phnom Penh.

In his interview with reporters, Mam Sonando said that he was not afraid of being arrested by the cops because he is not involved with any case where he would incite people to grab land, accusations that were leveled against villagers in Kampong Damrey commune, Chhlong district, Kratie province.

Khmer Independence, Part of Untold Story - by Khmer Wathanakam

King Sihanouk and French Officers

King Sihanouk and his militias searched for Vietminh troops

By Khmer Wathanakam
www.khmerwathnak.blogspot.com

Cambodia was bestowed under French protectorate when its leaders were unable to safeguard it from continuous onslaughts of its two powerful neighbors--Vietnam and Thailand. "The colonial era began without a shot and in a very tentative way" said, David Chandler, an Academic Historian.  King Norodom, a Thai's protege, concluded a treaty with  French officers in 1863 without Thai's knowledge, and the treaty was ratified by the French Government in Paris early 1864--it was too late to react when Thailand found out later.  Under the French protectorate, Cambodia received both positive and negative effects.  Positively, the French provided Cambodia full protection, introduced land reforms, ideas of democracy, judicial system, technology, and abolished slavery.  However, there were much more negative effects than positive ones: the French ceded parts of Khmer territory to Vietnam, imposed heavy taxes on people, plundered Khmer natural resources to enrich themselves, destroyed Khmer Language, new democracy, and refused to grant full independence to Khmer Nationalists.  Cambodia independence was not easily and freely granted by the French but by relentless struggles of our Khmer Heroes and most of them left out without recognition.

After the end of World War II, independence movements sprang up all over the world.  In Indochina, the struggles for independence spread throughout the three countries from many different groups of nationalist, Communist, monarchist, and democrat. In Cambodia, the combined forces of nationalist and democrat group was a spearhead of a struggle for independence followed by the communist and monarchist groups. When the World War was over, the French started to loosen its power grip to all people in their colonies.  exclusively, in 1946, the French allowed a first democratic election on our country to choose the constituent assembly. Three political parties were emerged led by three princes: Prince Sisowat Yuthevong, a father of Khmer Democracy, was a honored president of a Democratic Party, the most popular party in that time; a Liberal Party led by Prince Norodom Narindeth and a Progressive Party led by Prince Norodom Monthana.   Although the three princes had different political ideologies, but they shared the same loyalty to a throne and the same concern to  the growing power of Khmer Vietminh (the Communist party created by Ho Chi Minh in1930 to liberate the whole Indochina from the French).

Protest to The Phnom Penh Post mischaracterization of the word "Yuon"

Dear KI-Media Readers,

In light of the recent “incitation to racial discrimination” charge brought up by the Svay Rieng court against Mr. Sam Rainsy, and the recent echo by Mr. Meas Sokchea of the Phnom Penh Post, characterizing the use of the word “Yuon” by Mr. Sam Rainsy as being a “racist epithet for the Vietnamese,” we are providing below a letter written by Mr. Kenneth So sent to the Washington Times in 2002. While the response by Mr. Kenneth So was sent in regards of an article written by Dr. David Roberts, we are dismayed by the characterization made by Mr. Meas Sokchea, a Cambodian journalist, who should know the Khmer use of this word better than others.

We would personally like to hear Mr. Meas Sokchea ordering a bowl of “Samlor Machou Yuon” (Vietnamese sour soup) in Khmer, if using the word Yuon is a racist epithet, would Mr. Meas Sochea rather order a bowl of “Samor Machou Vietnam” instead? If so, would Mr. Meas Sokchea write an article advising Vietnamese people all over the world to stop calling Cambodians as the pejorative “Mien” as well?

The current “racism” labeling campaign against Mr. Sam Rainsy led by Mr. Hun Sen’s regime is orchestrated to discredit Mr. Sam Rainsy in the eyes of the International opinion, and thus marginalizing the current encroachments made by Vietnam. The complicit echoing of such misunderstanding by a Cambodian reporter on a well-known local news media, such as The Phnom Penh Post, is simply unacceptable. Therefore, we urge all our readers to please send your protest and opinion on the use of the word “Yuon” to The Phnom Penh Post to correct this mischaracterization by Mr. Meas Sokchea.

Please send your email protest to The Phnom Penh Post at the following email addresses:

1. newsroom@phnompenhpost.com
2. Seth Meixner, Editor in Chief, sd_meixner@yahoo.com
3. Laura Snook, National News Editor, laura.snook@phnompenhpost.com
4. Meas Sokchea, Reporter, sokchea.meas@phnompenhpost.com

Thank you,

KI-Media team
--------

Kenneth So's letter to the Washigton Time

September 20, 2002

Dear Sir:

I am writing this letter in response to your Washington Times article of Dr. David Roberts (Lecturer from the School of History and International Affairs, University of Ulster, Northern Ireland) dated 09/13/02, who accused the Cambodian opposition leader Sam Rainsy as undemocratic and authoritarian. In addition, he implied that Mr. Sam Rainsy was a racist, when he used the word “Youn” to refer to the Vietnamese.

First, the Cambodian opposition leader Sam Rainsy is a true patriot and democrat. He is well deserving of the award that was given to him by Senator John McCain.

Dr. Roberts may be an expert in his field but he is no expert in Khmer language. In the Khmer dictionary, it says “Youn” means Vietnamese and is possibly related to the Sanskrit word “Yavana” that means savage. However, this possibility of a link between the words “Youn” and “Yavana” is just pure speculation and has no basis for it.

Anyhow, my own research indicates that the word “Youn” came from the word “Yueh”. The Mandarin Chinese calls Vietnam, Yueh Nam. The word “Nam” means south in Chinese. “Yueh” indicates the name of the people of that region. Therefore, “Yueh” means Viet or Vietnamese in Chinese and “Yueh Nam” means the “Yueh” people of the south. In this case, south means south of China. The North pronounces it Yeknam (with a “Y” sound).

Chou Ta-Kuan (Zhou Daguan), the celebrated Chinese Ambassador to Cambodia in the 13th century, indicated in his report that there was already a large population of Chinese settling in Cambodia at that time. He said that the Chinese preferred life in the Khmer Empire because it was easier than in China. There were a lot of Chinese men marrying the native Cambodian women. I don't know when Khmer started to call the Vietnamese “Youn”, but the habit may have been picked up from the Chinese settlers who lived in Cambodia at the time. The word “Youn” may have derived from the Chinese word “Yueh” to indicate the Vietnamese. If one starts to think about it, “Viet” (as pronounced by the North Vietnamese) or “Yeak” (as pronounced by the South Vietnamese) sounds very similar to “Yueh”; and “Yueh”, meaning Vietnamese, in turn sounds very similar to “Youn”. George Coedes, the French expert on the Southeast Asian classical study, found an earlier evidence of the word “Yuon” inscribed in Khmer on a stele dating to the time of the Khmer King Suryavarman I (1002-1050.)

Why do the so-called Western scholars and journalists keep on perpetrating this kind of misinformation about the word “Yuon”? “Youn” does not mean savage as Dr. Roberts had mistakenly indicated in his writing. Savage in Cambodian means "Pourk Prey" or "Phnong". Cambodians calls Vietnamese “Youn” the same way they call Indian “Khleung”, Burmese “Phoumea”, Chinese “Chen”, and French “Barang”.

When the Vietnamese calls Cambodian “Mien” why did the Western press and scholars not report it to be a derogatory word also? If I were to follow the logical thinking of the Western press and scholars, then “Mien” must be a derogatory word also. In the late 17th century, the Vietnamese court of Hue had indiscriminately changed the names of the Cambodian princesses Ang Mei, Ang Pen, Ang Peou, and Ang Snguon to the Vietnamese sounding names of Ngoc-van, Ngoc-bien, Ngoc-tu, and Ngoc-nguyen, respectively. Also they changed the name of Phnom Penh to Nam Vang. Why do scholars and press stay silent on these subjects.

It is very dangerous for foreigners, like Dr. Roberts, to interpret the meaning of certain native words when they do not fully understand the languages and customs of those natives. It is people like Dr. Roberts who helps perpetrate the misinterpretation and misunderstanding of the word “Youn” to mean savage. aggravate the mistrust and hate between Cambodian and Vietnamese.

Cambodians have been using the word “Youn” to refer to the Vietnameses before the word Vietnamese had even existed. Because of the ignorance of some scholars and journalists about the meaning of this word, are we therefore supposed to abandon using this word that we have done from time immemorial?

If Dr. Roberts insists on saying that the word “Youn” means savage, then I would ask him to prove to Cambodians how it is so. How does he know that this word means savage? What did he base his knowledge from? If he is a true scholar, then he must not base his understanding on hearsay. Otherwise, his credibility is at risk.

Sincerely,

Kenneth T. So

Cambodia Raises Stakes, as Ties with Thailand Plummet

Saturday, November 14, 2009
By MARWAAN MACAN-MARKAR
IPS WRITER

BANGKOK — Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen is known for his brash and earthy vocabulary even when, as he did in early April, he talks about himself. “I am neither a gangster nor a gentleman, but a real man,” the politician who has led his country for 25 years said in a fit of rage.

The target of his ire at the time was Thai Foreign Minister Kasit Piromya, following comments the latter had made during a parliamentary debate in the Thai capital.

Hun Sen criticized Kasit for calling him a “gangster” during that debate, but Kasit shot back, saying his description of Hun Sen in Thai had got lost in translation. The actual words were “Nak Leng,” Kasit had explained, which in Thai means “a person who is lion-hearted, a courageous and magnanimous gentleman.”

It was Kasit’s second run-in with the Cambodian leader in under a year. In late 2008, when the former veteran Thai diplomat was in the political wilderness as a speaker for a conservative, right-wing protest movement, he had called Hun Sen a “thug” during a speech at a public rally.

If the new Thai government, formed under a cloud of controversy last December, was hoping that Hun Sen would move on from such moments, then the current war of words between the two countries suggests otherwise.

“The Thais seem to have forgotten that Hun Sen has a very good memory. He does not forget easily,” a Southeast Asian diplomat from a regional capital told IPS on the condition of anonymity. “He unearths details and history he knows well to go after those who criticize him.”

But the current war of words between Cambodia and Thailand has degenerated into personal insults and a trading of charges about interfering into each country’s judicial and domestic affairs.

Hun Sen raised the stakes this week in an increasingly volatile relationship between the two Southeast Asian kingdoms by targeting his Thai counterpart, Abhisit Vejjajiva, in a verbal barrage.

“I would not be surprised if there was a link here with comments made by political allies of Abhisit,” the diplomat added. “It is Hun Sen getting back.”

Besides words, Phnom Penh also rejected a request by Bangkok on Wednesday for the extradition of ousted prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, who arrived in Cambodia on Tuesday to begin his new role as Hun Sen’s economic advisor.

Thaksin, whose popular elected government was turfed out of power in a 2006 military coup, has been living in exile to avoid a two-year jail term after a Thai court found him guilty in a conflict-of-interest case.

To goad the Abhisit administration, Hun Sen welcomed Thaksin with open arms and handshakes, and offered his own villa in Phnom Penh for the fugitive former Thai premier to stay in.

Bangkok has not fallen for Phnom Penh’s bait, for now. Even though it bristles at such hospitality and the verbal salvos, the Thai government is trying to stay above the fray, offering statements that appear calm and diplomatic.

“The government is stressing that the problem between both countries is still a bilateral issue,” Thani Thongphakdi, the Thai Foreign Ministry’s deputy spokesman, told IPS. “We want to see a positive sign from Cambodia that gives precedence to bilateral ties over personal relationships.”

Yet at the same time, the Thai government is taking a tougher line towards the range of ties it maintains with its eastern neighbor. “We are reviewing existing agreements, existing cooperation and future cooperation between the two countries,” Thani revealed. “Everything is on the table.”

Bangkok’s unilateral actions against Cambodia has already seen the Thai ambassador in Phnom Penh withdrawn and Thailand revoking a memorandum of understanding between the two countries to explore oil and gas reserves in the Gulf of Thailand.

It followed Hun Sen’s tongue-lashing that targeted Abhisit. “People should know that when I was starting my political career, [Abhisit] was still a child running around, playing,” Hun Sen told Cambodian journalists on Sunday.

“If Abhisit is so sure of himself, then he should call an election. What are you afraid of? Is it that you are afraid you will not be the prime minister?” Hun Sen continued, driving home his status as Southeast Asia’s longest-standing premier, as opposed to Abhisit, who has been in office for less than a year.

“I am prime minister of Cambodia who has received two-thirds of the vote in the Cambodian parliament. How many votes does Abhisit have? You have chosen somebody else’s chair to seat yourself in,” goaded Hun Sen, referring to the question of legitimacy that has dogged the Abhisit government. “You claim other people’s property as your own. How can we respect that?”

The 57-year-old Hun Sen has been Cambodia’s premier for 25 years, a period during which he has not shied from revealing his authoritarian streak, using a mix of violence, intrigue and verbal attacks to cling to power. His journey to power began on the economic and social fringes of the poorer Cambodia, including a short stint when still a teenager as a soldier for the genocidal Khmer Rouge in the later 1970s.

The 45-year-old Abhisit hails from the opposite end of the socioeconomic spectrum, being born into wealth, enjoying a British education and feeling at home among Thailand’s patricians. He formed a coalition government after a controversial court ruling last December saw the collapse of the elected government. Through a combination of military influence and cash enticements to broker a deal, his Democrat-led government came to power by parliamentary vote rather than by going to the polls in a general election.

Hun Sen’s penchant for dipping into his country’s history to take on the Abhisit administration is also threatening to expose a darker side of Thailand’s relationship with its poorer and weaker eastern neighbor.

To counter Bangkok’s current charges that Phnom Penh is interfering in Thailand’s internal politics and judicial system by rolling out the welcome mat for Thaksin, Hun Sen retorts by reminding the Thais about the hospitality they offered to Khmer Rouge leaders like Khieu Samphan and Nuon Chea, now about to face justice in a United Nations war crimes tribunal.

“The Thai judiciary has not much value to be respected,” Hun Sen said during his weekend encounter with Cambodian journalists. “Khmer Rouge leaders Khieu Samphan and Nuon Chea were living in Thailand for years. This was a violation of international law that Thailand had signed.”

“Hun Sen is absolutely correct,” said Tom Fawthrop, co-author of “Getting away with Genocide? Elusive Justice and the Khmer Rouge Tribunal.” “In fact, after 1979, when the Khmer Rouge were driven out of Cambodia by Vietnam, [Khmer Rouge leader] Pol Pot and other leaders all fled to Thailand.”

“The Khmer Rouge’s fight to regain power was aided by logistics and weapons that flowed through Thailand, even tanks,” Fawthrop, a regional expert who spends time in Phnom Penh, told IPS. “The Thais violated the international law after the 1991 Paris peace accord by letting the Khmer Rouge operate along its border, which was not the case along the Vietnamese and Laotian borders.”

Hun Sen’s current anti-Abhisit rhetoric may not be the isolated views of Cambodia’s leader but may find resonance among its people, added Fawthrop. “The Thai-Cambodian relationship has to be looked at in a historical context. The Cambodians feel a huge sense of grievance.”

The Extraordinary gas Chambers CIJs are a FARTING FARCE ! FARCE! FARCE!

By Khmer Democrat, Phnom Penh
A Farting Farce is the Justice of the Poor, say Co-Investigating Judges You Bunleng and Siegfried Blunk Series

A FARTING FARCE
2. A ludicrous, empty show; a mockery (the Free Dictionary)

Excerpt from Ms. Theary C. Seng's Press Release, May 5, 2011

Press Release: Theary Seng appealing ECCC decision re Meas Muth and Sou Met; lodging new applicatio​n against Im Chaem, Ta An, Ta Tith

"In this one application, I publicly named and expressly hold Khmer Rouge military commanders Meas Muth and Sou Met directly, personally, individually responsible to me for the Crimes against Humanity (including the legal elements of murder, extermination, enslavement, imprisonment, torture, political persecution) in their roles as commanders of the Navy and Air Force of Democratic Kampuchea [national positions], respectively, and for their material contribution in developing and implementing the common design and purpose of a joint criminal enterprise [resulting in 1,700,000 deaths] which impacted the whole of Cambodia. That is to say, as a matter of international law, they are directly responsible for my legal injuries during the fall and exodus out of Phnom Penh (Phase I Movement) when my father, a Lon Nol military commander, “disappeared” [if rejecting Ms. Theary C. Seng's application, the CIJs are saying that these national military commanders of the Navy and Air Force had nothing to do with the capture and exodus of Phnom Penh????!!!!!] ; and the movement of the population of the East Zone (Phase 3) [expressly mentioned in the Introductory Submission as noted by UN Co-Prosecutor in his Press Release, May 9, 2011] when the Khmer Rouge imprisoned my family and me first at Wat Tlork and then Boeung Rai Security Centers, where I experienced and witnessed, inter alia, the death of my mother, among the 30,000 (thirty-thousand) lives estimated to have been extinguished at Boeung Rai. Here, the legal nexus are the CRIMES, not the geographically districts and zones they physically commandeered, vis-à-vis me as an applicant, except for their criminal actions as they were related to the capture and exodus out of Phnom Penh in 1975 when we shared proximity."

The U.N. Co-Prosecutor is smart in the nick of time in switching to the right side of history. with this detailed press release of May 9, 2011. But where are the "official voices of the victims" [cough! cough!] - Mr. Ang Pich and Ms. Elisabeth Simmoneau-Fort? Where are the other U.N. judges and senior officials in condemning the travesty of justice underway?

Hello,
anyone there??????!!!!!!!

[Thai] PM to seek pardon for [PAD] activists [-Fundraising for PAD activists instead of helping Khmer soldiers killed by the Thais?]

September 9, 2011
By Somroutai Sapsomboon
The Nation

The [soccer] match would take place in Phnom Penh between Pheu Thai MPs and Cambodian officials to raise funds to help Thai activists Veera and Ratree and victims of the bloody crackdown in May last year, he said. [KI-Media note: How about raising funds to help families of Cambodian soldiers killed by Thai soldiers?]

Hopes high for Veera, Ratree as Thai MPs and Cambodian officials plan soccer match in Phnom Penh

The visit of Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra to Phnom Penh next week, followed by a friendly soccer match between Thai MPs and Cambodian officials, and maybe a visit there by former premier Thaksin Shinawatra, would strengthen ties between the two neighbours, Pheu Thai MP Jatuporn Promphan said yesterday.

It might even help secure the release of two Thai nationalist activists held by the Cambodians.

Yingluck was scheduled to visit Cambodia on September 15, to introduce herself as the new prime minister of Thailand and to mend diplomatic relations damaged during the Abhisit Vejjajiva government.

'Aide-Toi, Le Ciel T’Aidera' [-"Help yourself, and heaven will help you"]

"Don’t think that everybody is in line with ‘chaul stung tarm bawt’. People here are just lying low for the right moment to burst into a violent flame and anger. They are keeping themselves quiet because they need security and time to educate and feed their family. People in the streets are complaining about the same story daily: The lack of justice, freedom of expression, violation of human rights, illegal land grabbing, unemployment, high cost of living, and endless other complaints…"

Tim Sakmony (L) and Yorm Bopha (R)

16 Sept 2012

An article by Dr. Gaffar Peang-Meth published by the Asian Human Rights Commission

It’s useful once in a while to recall that I am not a politician and have no desire to be one. I am not here to tell people what they like to hear nor to disparage. I believe in the principles and ideals of republicanism; and I write about subjects I believe I am qualified to discuss. Readers’ actions and reactions are their own. While disagreements can provide the fodder for healthy debate, those engaging in debate should not display arrogance or intolerance. Passionate opinion can be expressed with civility.

My last article, "Khmer diplomat dubs Hun Sen a fabricator of Khmer history," appeared on the day of the late Srey Pheach’s funeral, attended by so many. It brought e-mails from Pheach’s friends and acquaintances from different places and from Phnom Penh where sits the dictator against whom Pheach fought until his last breath.

Validation

Pheach’s writing was validated by a high ranking member of the Khmer elite in Phnom Penh, whose credibility I have never doubted. I knew him when he was in the thick of the political events examined in the article. He referred to my article as "the most well written true story of Cambodia’s bloody past by the late Srey Pheach."

But he also added to the story Pheach shared. My friend wrote that Pheach did not mention the cessation of US bombings in 1973, followed by the "fast reduction of US forces from Vietnam," which hardened the "stubborn position" of the Vietcong and the North Vietnamese at the Paris conference. The war dragged on "for two more years until the total collapse of . . . Cambodia, Laos and South Vietnam"; and though Prince Sihanouk was assured by the VC/NVN they would help him return to power, they "preferred to deal with the Khmer Rouge for tactical and political reasons rather than with the . . . too independent minded" Prince Sihanouk.

A week earlier, a former US foreign service officer who had been attached to the US Embassy in Phnom Penh, told me he rejected "the old leftist allegation that US bombing was responsible for causing many Cambodian peasants to join the Khmer Rouge . . . used as an excuse for the atrocities perpetrated by the KR, a sort of ‘the bombing made them do it.’" He reiterated, Cambodians joined "the fight" called by Prince Sihanouk because they thought it was to restore the monarchy, rather than to support the Khmer Rouge. "Those allegations that the bombing caused people to join the KR are not based on any clear evidence as far as I know," he wrote. "This is an idea concocted mostly by Western intellectuals who then attempted to attribute it to the Khmer peasants."

CAMBODIA: Toppling cambodian dictators is not impossible if we think smart and act smart

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tk9O3sFuMS0

"He who abuses you so has only two eyes, has but two hands, one body, and has naught but what has the least man of the great and infinite number of your cities, except for the advantage you give him to destroy you." - Etienne de La Boetie

Tuesday, January 17, 2012
An article by Dr. Gaffar Peang-Meth published by the Asian Human Rights Commission

My grandson, 12, a seventh grader, read "The Case for Democracy: The Power of Freedom to Overcome Tyranny and Terror" (2004), a bestseller by a former Soviet prisoner, Natan Sharansky. He passed the book to me, saying I might be interested in reading it.

I had read about Sharansky, 9 years a prisoner in the Soviet gulag; I hadn't read his book. I immediately opened the book to pages my grandson had bookmarked: Sharansky's distinction between "free societies" and "fear societies"; Sharansky's description of believers, dissenters and the millions of "double thinkers" who don't speak their thoughts because of fear of arrest, imprisonment and physical harm so they speak with their "eyes" but go through the motion of supporting rulers who are interested only in remaining forever in power.

Sharansky contends that elections are not enough to dub a society free – a free press, an independent judiciary, the rule of law must exist before genuine free elections are held. He became controversial as he blasted conservatives for placing "stability" above human rights in international relations, and liberals for failing to distinguish between struggling democracies and authoritarian regimes that overtly trample human rights. Sharansky advocates the universality of freedom and human rights.

As I browsed through the book, a Khmer saying came to my mind: "Tumpaeng snorng russey," referring to young bamboo shoots that grow to replace aging bamboo trees – the future is in the making.

A day later my grandson forwarded me comments by an anonymous blogger "Pissed Off" on KI-Media. Although I am rarely interested in anonymous postings, I have commented in this space before about Pissed Off's well-reasoned op-ed piece on the Internet about using our resources to educate every Khmer child as a way to resolve countless Khmer problems, including the much feared Vietnamization of Cambodia.

In his most recent posting, blogger "Pissed Off" commented on "potential Cambodian leaders" who oppose Hun Sen's rule as "like different streams that run fiercely toward the same goal, but cannot merge to reach that goal with a strong and full force. Perhaps the four rivers that merge in front (of) Phnom Penh can serve as an enlightenment for them to see."

Pissed Off's most relevant question: "(C)an't potential leaders of Cambodia be bound together by their education and the common goal of saving and helping Cambodia and her people?"

Peou Sorpong: "Hun Sen's 1997 Pre-emptive Coup Causes and Consequences", Southeast Asian Affairs (1998) - Re-post

HUN SEN’S PRE-EMPTIVE COUP
Causes and Consequences

Sorpong Peou
Southeast Asian Affairs (1998)

On 5-6 July 1997, troops loyal to Second Prime Minister Hun Sen (of the Cambodian People’s Party, or CPP) and those of First Prime Minister Norodom Randariddh (leader of the royalist party known as FUNCINPEC, or the National United Front for an Independent, Neutral, Peaceful, and Co-operative Cambodia) engaged in a fierce street battle in Phnom Penh. The fighting stunned the Cambodian people and the world. Within two days, the CPP force defeated its enemy, and then pushed the remnants against the northern Thai-Cambodian border into a tiny strategic area called O Smach. At year’s end, Hun Sen still held high the trophy of victory.

This article seeks to explore the events of July 1997. At issue is whether or not what took place constitutes a coup; and, if it is a coup, what kind? I argue that the overthrow of Ranariddh was a coup, not a social revolution or putsch. Unlike coups in many other countries, however, it was not caused by factors such as ethnic or ideological antagonisms, socio-political turmoil, or military dominance. I take a structural approach, arguing that Hun Sen’s actions must be explained in terms of his struggle for hegemonic preservation, as his party and adversaries braced themselves for the next election scheduled for 1998. (In this study, the term “hegemon” means “leader”, and struggle for hegemony simply means struggle for political leadership.) Although the Second Prime Minister has now achieved political dominance, preventing bipolarity from emerging, he has also recreated Cambodia’s old power structure, prone to coups, violence and war.

Prelude to a Pre-Emptive Coup

In the debate over whether Hun Sen’s actions were or were not a coup, those who supported or sympathized with the Second Prime Minister viewed them as preventing Prince Ranariddh from staging a coup against the government. Those who put the blame on Hun Sen considered his actions a coup. It may be worth describing politico-military developments leading to the July events and then examining the two opposing perspectives more closely.

In May 1993, elections were organized by the United Nations Transitional Authority in Cambodia (UNTAC), which intervened in the country following the Paris Agreement in October 1991. This resulted in a coalition among four elected parties: FUNCINPEC; the CPP; the Khmer People’s National Liberation Front (SPNLF) turned Buddhist Liberal Democratic Party (BLDP); and Molinaka, a Sihanouk-aligned group that fought against the State of Cambodia (as the CPP was previously known) in the 1980’s, but did not participate in the signing of the Paris Agreement. FUNCINPEC and the CPP emerged as the dominant parties, receiving respectively fifty-eight and fifty-one seats in a 120-member Constituent Assembly, which was transformed into the National Assembly in September 1993. Prince Ranariddh became First Prime Minister, and CPP leader Hun Sen Second Prime Minister.