The following is part two of a six-part interview between Khieu Samphan, the nominal Khmer Rouge head of state, and Mr. Sam Borin of Radio Free Asia. This interview was conducted in January, 2004 and was re-broadcast in November, 2007.
Translated from Khmer by Khmerization
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Sam Borin: Like we have agreed in our first interview, now once again I would like to invite you to the interview. Welcome to the interview, Mr. President.
Samphan: Thank you, Mr. Sam Borin.
Borin: Before, you have told me and our listeners that you are no longer the president of the presidium. You are now just an ordinary person.
Samphan: That's right.
Borin: I have thought to myself that for me to call you a president would make some people think that I have given too high an honour to a suspected criminal killer etc. But I wish to clarify that the reason I called you as Mr. President or Mr. ex-President in the interview is because I would like you to think back to the time when you were the leader of the Democratic Kampuchea regime. That's why I have used the word Mr. President to address you in our discussion. Do you have any objection to that?
Samphan: If you would like to bring my memories back to that period by calling me Mr. President I would not mind. But I would also like to take this opportunity to say to people that at that time I was not the leader. I was a leader in name only.
Borin: I hope that all our listeners now understand the reason why I called Mr. Khieu Samphan Mr. President or Mr. ex-President. In fact Mr. Khieu Samphan himself did not object to me calling him Mr. President of the Presidium or simply just Mr. President. Is that OK with you?
Samphan: Yes, it's ok.
Borin: Mr. President, if I'm not wrong, in your previous answers in past interviews, especially in relation to you giving up political struggle, in particular your parliamentary struggle, you said that the threats against your security and safety did not just happen in 1967 alone. There were a series of threats to your security before then. Is that right?
Samphan: That's right.
Borin: When we come to this point I have always heard our old people talked about one incident when you were an editor of the L'Observateur newspaper, which many people considered it to be a left-wing newspaper. At that time there were claims that the secret police agents have on one occasion kicked your motorbike while you were riding on it. And after the motorbike crashed, they stopped and strip searched you. Can you describe how that incident happen?
Samphan: At that time when I published my own newspaper we did not have any advanced technology like now such as computers or printers ect. And most of my staff can't even speak or write French. They have to set up the French alphabets manually one by one in order to create a text article. When they create the article to print they can't even read it. They just put the alphabets one by one in order to form an article and then print it. So they made a lot of errors because no one can read and understand French. Only me who can read and understand French so I have to work with them from morning till afternoon. And after I finished my work I rode my motorbike home. I just left my office not far from the Chinese Hospital on the Norodom Sihanouk boulevard.....
Borin: Your newspaper office was near the Chinese Hospital?
Samphan: Yes, it was. And in front of the Chinese Hospital there was a school there but I forgot the name.
Borin: If I'm not wrong it could be the 18th March School which was later renamed Yukanthor High School.
Samphan: It was possible that that school was renamed the 18th March School after the 1970's coup. Yes, that's right. My newspaper was on the side of the Chinese Hospital. And on the opposite side there was a school.
Borin: Mr. President, did you remember what the reason why the secret police strip-searched you at that time?
Samphan: No, at that time I did not know the reason. First I thought that they were ordinary people because they were dressed in old civilian clothes like the cyclopusse (rickshaw) drivers. But when I think carefully I knew that they were not ordinary cyclopusse drivers. And later, because of the arrest warrants against me, I came to the conclusion that they were not just ordinary cyclopusse drivers. That incident was like this: they kicked my moving motorbike and when it crashed they arrested me and they tried to take off my clothes and I struggled with them very hard. But because there were too many of them they succeeded in stripping me off my clothes, in the middle of the street and in broad daylight. So I ran to a nearby house and the owner gave me a kramar ( a towel-type piece of cloth) to cover myself. That's what happened.
Borin: That incident was happened while you were a member of parliament or it happened before that?
Samphan: It happened before I became a member of parliament. At that time I was still an editor of my newspaper. I became a member of parliament after that incident. And when I closed my newspaper, and after discussing it with Mr. Sangyun, I applied for a membership of the Sangkum Reastr Niyum Party. He advised me that:"Samphan, don't publish your newspaper anymore. You must apply to become a member of the Sangkum Reastr Niyum Party, stand in the election and I will help you become a member of parliament".
At that time His Majesty (Sihanouk) made great efforts to implement a policy of neutrality. But due to immense pressures from America and due to many other factors the Prince had made an effort to make friend with the socialist countries. Also at that time during the Bandung Conference of the non-aligned countries, the Prince had established a very good friendship with the Chinese Premier Chou Enlai because the Bandung Conference was an initiative of Nehru and Chou Enlai. And there were lots of Cambodia's friends at the conference.
Borin: For this point I will ask you later. But now I would like to return back to one point which I remember clearly and that is you were one of the ardent supporters of a policy of neutrality envisaged by Prince Sihanouk. When you fled to the jungle in 1967 it was during a period under Sihanouk's rule. I'm wondering that since you were a member of parliament of the Sangkum Reastr Niyum Party, and the president of the party was also a head of state. Why did you flee to the jungle instead of explaining your case to the party's president? At that time what sorts of support did the party's president (Sihanouk) give to you?
Samphan: That event, occurred as I have told you before. It was due to the peasants' uprising in Samlaut. So the local authorities have launched a systematic persecutions similar to the persecutions carried out by Suharto against the Indonesian Communist Party. There were too many killings. That's why at that time people were whispering to each other around Phnom Penh that in Cambodia there was also a Suharto-Nasution clique as well......//(To be continued in parts 3, 4, 5, 6....). To read part three click here.
No comments:
Post a Comment