12 November 2007AFP
PHNOM PENH - A radical student who studied in France, Ieng Sary later emerged as the public face of one of the 20th century’s most brutal regimes, Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge.
As the regime’s top diplomat, he was frequently the only point of contact between Cambodia’s secretive communist rulers and the outside world.
Ieng Sary, who served as the regime’s foreign minister, was also one of the biggest public supporters of the Khmer Rouge’s mass purges, researchers say.
The 78 year-old has never been fully held accountable for his role in Cambodia’s genocide.
But evidence does exist of Ieng Sary, who was arrested Monday by Cambodia’s UN-backed genocide tribunal, “repeatedly and publicly encouraging arrests and execution.”
“He came as close as any senior DK (Khmer Rouge) official in power ever did to describing publicly... the policy of executing”, said Stephen Heder and Brian Tittemore in their book “Seven Candidates for Prosecution; Accountability for the Crimes of the Khmer Rouge.”
Up to two million people died of starvation and overwork, or were executed, as the Khmer Rouge set about dismantling modern Cambodia after seizing control of the country.
But as much as he was an advocate for the regime during its 1975-79 rule, Ieng Sary’s defection to the government 17 years later proved a death blow to the then-disintegrating movement.
His departure came two years before the 1998 death of Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot, whom he first met at school in the capital Phnom Penh and later joined at university in Paris as eager supporters of the communist movement there.
Ieng Sary’s modest roots — he was born to a poor ethnic Khmer family in south Vietnam in 1929 -- proved a firm foundation for his later plunge into nationalist struggle.
At university in France, he joined the French Communist Party and became a Marxist student leader.
Marriage
After marrying Khieu Thirith, a beautiful intellectual who was the sister of Pol Pot’s new wife Khieu Ponnary, Ieng Sary returned to Phnom Penh from Paris with his bride, helping to build up a clandestine communist organisation throughout the 1950s.
Ieng Sary quickly rose through the ranks of the Cambodian Communist Party, being promoted to its powerful standing committee in 1963.
But that year both Ieng Sary and Pol Pot were targeted as subversives by Prince Norodom Sihanouk, who was waging a violent campaign against an increasingly radical left-wing.
They fled with their wives to the jungles of Cambodia’s northeast along with other marked communists, where they continued building their networks.
In 1971 Ieng Sary was dispatched by the Party to Beijing to force support for armed struggle from an exiled Sihanouk, who was being urged by China to link up with Cambodian communists following his ouster in a coup the year before.
Ieng Sary was also instructed to handle the Party’s international relations, and in 1975 was formally named foreign minister of the new regime.
Under the regime, he was key in convincing educated Cambodians who had fled the civil war to return under the guise of rebuilding their battered country.
Most of these intellectuals — many of them diplomats taken from Ieng Sary’s foreign ministry with his knowledge — would later be killed in the wholesale purges that came to define the Khmer Rouge’s rule.
In 1979 Ieng Sary fled to Thailand after Vietnamese troops and Khmer Rouge defectors swept through Cambodia. He was sentenced in absentia to death by a Vietnamese-backed war crimes tribunal hastily convened that year.
In the years of fighting that followed, Ieng Sary continued to be an crucial link between the Khmer Rouge and China, a key source of money, arms and political support.
But during the 1990s the aid dried up, and amid accusation from his former comrades that he had plundered millions of dollars of timber and gems, Ieng Sary defected to the government in 1996 with thousands of Khmer Rouge fighters.
He was pardoned by Sihanouk, who by then was again king, and lived freely — reportedly in luxury — in Cambodia until being seized by the genocide court.
His wife Thirith, who also became a minister in the Khmer Rouge regime, was arrested alongside him on Monday.
As the regime’s top diplomat, he was frequently the only point of contact between Cambodia’s secretive communist rulers and the outside world.
Ieng Sary, who served as the regime’s foreign minister, was also one of the biggest public supporters of the Khmer Rouge’s mass purges, researchers say.
The 78 year-old has never been fully held accountable for his role in Cambodia’s genocide.
But evidence does exist of Ieng Sary, who was arrested Monday by Cambodia’s UN-backed genocide tribunal, “repeatedly and publicly encouraging arrests and execution.”
“He came as close as any senior DK (Khmer Rouge) official in power ever did to describing publicly... the policy of executing”, said Stephen Heder and Brian Tittemore in their book “Seven Candidates for Prosecution; Accountability for the Crimes of the Khmer Rouge.”
Up to two million people died of starvation and overwork, or were executed, as the Khmer Rouge set about dismantling modern Cambodia after seizing control of the country.
But as much as he was an advocate for the regime during its 1975-79 rule, Ieng Sary’s defection to the government 17 years later proved a death blow to the then-disintegrating movement.
His departure came two years before the 1998 death of Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot, whom he first met at school in the capital Phnom Penh and later joined at university in Paris as eager supporters of the communist movement there.
Ieng Sary’s modest roots — he was born to a poor ethnic Khmer family in south Vietnam in 1929 -- proved a firm foundation for his later plunge into nationalist struggle.
At university in France, he joined the French Communist Party and became a Marxist student leader.
Marriage
After marrying Khieu Thirith, a beautiful intellectual who was the sister of Pol Pot’s new wife Khieu Ponnary, Ieng Sary returned to Phnom Penh from Paris with his bride, helping to build up a clandestine communist organisation throughout the 1950s.
Ieng Sary quickly rose through the ranks of the Cambodian Communist Party, being promoted to its powerful standing committee in 1963.
But that year both Ieng Sary and Pol Pot were targeted as subversives by Prince Norodom Sihanouk, who was waging a violent campaign against an increasingly radical left-wing.
They fled with their wives to the jungles of Cambodia’s northeast along with other marked communists, where they continued building their networks.
In 1971 Ieng Sary was dispatched by the Party to Beijing to force support for armed struggle from an exiled Sihanouk, who was being urged by China to link up with Cambodian communists following his ouster in a coup the year before.
Ieng Sary was also instructed to handle the Party’s international relations, and in 1975 was formally named foreign minister of the new regime.
Under the regime, he was key in convincing educated Cambodians who had fled the civil war to return under the guise of rebuilding their battered country.
Most of these intellectuals — many of them diplomats taken from Ieng Sary’s foreign ministry with his knowledge — would later be killed in the wholesale purges that came to define the Khmer Rouge’s rule.
In 1979 Ieng Sary fled to Thailand after Vietnamese troops and Khmer Rouge defectors swept through Cambodia. He was sentenced in absentia to death by a Vietnamese-backed war crimes tribunal hastily convened that year.
In the years of fighting that followed, Ieng Sary continued to be an crucial link between the Khmer Rouge and China, a key source of money, arms and political support.
But during the 1990s the aid dried up, and amid accusation from his former comrades that he had plundered millions of dollars of timber and gems, Ieng Sary defected to the government in 1996 with thousands of Khmer Rouge fighters.
He was pardoned by Sihanouk, who by then was again king, and lived freely — reportedly in luxury — in Cambodia until being seized by the genocide court.
His wife Thirith, who also became a minister in the Khmer Rouge regime, was arrested alongside him on Monday.
15 comments:
This guy pretends to be innocent and not guilty while replying to the CNN interview: the reality is he is one of the butcher for the genocide of cambodiam people.
He might be guilty, but he's a diplomat, as stated in the second paragraph of the article.
I am not aware of any record of the tribunal ever convicted a diplomat before. Does anyone know otherwise?
http://www.cambodia.org/blogs/editorials/2007/09/cambodia-to-terminate-khmer-rouge.html#comments
Sihanouk is a cheater.
Before the war, he killed many men who know his plan, he created secretly the KR army and provided them guns and weapons .
The KR can not be powerful without him.
He knows that he can not win in a democratic election because the people of Phnom Penh did not support him.
hoo 35 years later lies!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
It is very easy to destroy our own country : you have just to call your enemies and they will support you 100%.
Enquête
Le vétéran qui accuse les Khmers rouges
LE MONDE | 22.05.07 | 14h30 • Mis à jour le 12.11.07 | 09h27
TAVENG (nord-est du Cambodge) ÉNVOYÉ SPÉCIAL
Le vieillard maigre mais solide, vêtu d'une simple étoffe nouée à la ceinture, la peau du buste plissée et luisante comme un batracien, assis en tailleur dans la pièce unique de la maison, est aussi résolu que le suggère sa mâchoire carrée : "Je veux voir les Khieu Samphan, Ieng Sary et Nuon Chea condamnés à la prison. Ce sont des assassins. J'irai au tribunal spécial Khmers rouges à Phnom Penh. Je veux savoir ce qu'il se sera dit. Si l'on souhaite m'interroger, je témoignerai". Kham Thoeun a 80 ans et c'est le seul vétéran de toutes les guerres d'Indochine du siècle dernier encore en vie dans ce recoin de jungle du Nord-Est cambodgien qui fut la première "capitale" insurgée de Pol Pot, le chef des Khmers rouges.
Ces guerres, il en fut dès la première, le soulèvement anticolonial des Issaraks (Khmers libres) contre l'administration française, au lendemain de la seconde guerre mondiale, et jusqu'à la dernière, l'opération militaire vietnamienne de l'hiver 1978-1979 qui mit fin au régime de Pol Pot, le Kampuchéa démocratique, de meurtrière réputation.
Le vétéran n'a rien oublié des agissements des Khmers rouges. "Ces hommes ont tué avant d'avoir pris le pouvoir à Phnom Penh (en 1975). Je l'ai vu ici même", raconte-t-il. Ici, c'est une clairière, occupée par une trentaine de baraques, qui sert de chef-lieu de district à environ 5 000 habitants répartis dans la jungle alentour. Et de raconter son étonnant parcours.
"Grâce à l'appui des communistes vietnamiens, nous avions créé dans les années 1950 une poche d'indépendance que Phnom Penh ne parvenait plus à contrôler". On est ici à la lisière des hauts plateaux d'Indochine, sur la rivière O'Chhel, à équidistance (une trentaine de kilomètres à vol d'oiseau) des frontières du Vietnam et du Laos, un recoin de la célèbre "piste Ho Chi Minh". La région est majoritairement peuplée d'ethnies montagnardes. Kham Thoeun lui-même est un Brao, il s'exprime difficilement en khmer, plus facilement en vietnamien ou en lao.
"Le Parti communiste cambodgien s'est installé ici au milieu des années 1960, poursuit-il. Mais c'était avant que Pol Pot n'en prenne le contrôle. Vers 1967, ce fut Ieng Sary qui devint le chef de la région. Il était plutôt populaire. La société était assez militarisée, puisque nous étions en guerre sous les bombardements américains, mais le peuple avait de quoi manger".
Puis arriva Pol Pot, qui venait d'arracher à ses mentors communistes vietnamiens la permission d'établir dans cette province de Ratanikiri une base insurgée khmère. Celle-ci deviendra effectivement la première "zone libérée" échappant au contrôle du régime de Lon Nol, à partir de 1971, sous les noms de code "Bureau 102" ou "K-5". "Dès 1970, ce fut la bagarre pour le pouvoir entre anciens Pol Pot et nouveaux Pol Pot", résume à grands traits le combattant, qui avait alors été fait administrateur civil du district. "De 1970 à 1975, ils se sont mis à s'entre-tuer en se traitant mutuellement de traîtres. Les nouveaux accusaient les anciens d'être à la solde des Vietnamiens. Ieng Sary s'est mis du côté de Pol Pot. Il y a dans la région des charniers qui remontent à cette époque-là", alors que la guerre américaine faisait rage. "Et la population a été progressivement réduite à l'esclavage. D'ailleurs, beaucoup de gens avaient fui, emmenant famille et bétail. Taveng était devenue une ville vide de civils".
Ce témoignage tord le cou à la légende selon laquelle la zone est du pays n'a connu qu'une forme adoucie de la dictature polpotiste par rapport à l'ouest, où les charniers de victimes, ensevelies parfois vivantes, abondent. Dès avant la prise de Phnom Penh, les Khmers rouges s'exerçaient ici à un règne sanglant, comme le suggérait la CIA américaine dans une incrédulité générale.
Kham Thoeun, comme d'autres, prit sa décision : s'enfuir. Un mois de marche dans la jungle vers le nord, à l'été 1975, et il se retrouva à Pakse, au Laos. Il y trouva un petit boulot de garçon de café. La guerre était finie. Les communistes avaient gagné la partie en Indochine. Sous Pol Pot, la tragédie du Cambodge commençait.
"Puis en 1978, des conseillers vietnamiens sont venus au Laos rassembler d'anciens soldats cambodgiens pour partir s'entraîner au Vietnam et former une armée contre Pol Pot. Nous fûmes 300 volontaires". Volontaires ? "Absolument ! Nous voulions en finir avec Pol Pot et ses proches. Ils avaient tué tant de monde". Ils participèrent à l'entrée des troupes vietnamiennes qui allaient mettre fin, le 7 janvier 1979, à l'expérience totalitaire du Kampuchéa démocratique. "Si c'était à refaire, je le referais, ajoute Kham Thoeun. Je veux absolument aller à Phnom Penh. Je veux savoir ce qui est dit au sujet de ces hommes. Comment le tribunal les traite, les condamne. C'est mon dernier acte politique".
Tout le monde n'est pas aussi passionné, à Taveng. Thie Sokun, la tenancière de l'une des deux gargotes du village, n'a pas "le temps de s'occuper de ce procès". D'ailleurs, dit-elle, "nous n'avons aucune information. C'est une affaire qui ne regarde que Phnom Penh". Elle est pourtant chef adjoint du village.
Venue des bords du Mékong, plus à l'ouest, elle s'est installée ici en 1996, quand le gouvernement de Hun Sen, l'actuel premier ministre, a négocié la reddition des insurgés khmers rouges de ces parages. Arrivée avec ses cinq enfants pour fuir un mari qui s'était mis en ménage avec une autre femme, elle a obtenu du gouvernement un prêt lui permettant de construire son échoppe.
Kham Thoeun, pour services rendus au pays, a quant à lui obtenu une maison qu'il a ensuite revendue pour payer ses soins médicaux, sa maigre retraite ne suffisant pas. Il s'est installé chez des neveux. Au cours de toutes ces années de combat, il n'a jamais rencontré Pol Pot ou aucun des grands chefs Khmers rouges en procès à Phnom Penh.
Francis Deron
The pardon of king Xi Hanuk means nothing to the court; so let arrest all of them including the king, ah Hun Sen, ah Heng Samrin, Ah Chea Sim ... etc they deserve put to dead or jail a whole family.
These are traitor who serve and vn slave.
another one in the line is Khiev Samphan.
and the line will be longer.
It's good new for all Khmer Rouge and Khmer Vietcong.
Khmer Rouge = Pol Pot, Khiev Samphan, Eang Sary +
Khmer Vietcong = King Xi hanuk, hun sen, heng samrin, chea sim +
Good luck !!!
11:43, you must remember to respect rule-of-law. King's pardon is lawful and binding forever. It cannot be undone.
To 3:22 AM
Yeah but only if he is a good king.
Is he?
Absolutely NO !!!
THE KING SIHANOUK HAS NO LAW HE SCREWED HIS OWN AUNT TO PRODUCE PRINCE CHAKROPONG, WHY SHOULD ANYONE RESPECT HIS PARDON , HE IS THE REAL DOG NOT JUST BORN UNDER YEAR OF DOG! HE'S IS AN AUNTFUCKER!
LOL 3:41 & 4:34!
All those Asians and Africans who studied in France usually came back to their own countries to kill their own people. The evil French has done a very good job to brainwash these people.
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