Nate Thayer

Dying Breath: The inside story of Pol Pot's last days and the disintegration of the movement he created

"Dying Breath: The Inside Story of Pol Pot's Last days and the Disintegration of the Movement he Created"

Far Eastern Economic Review
April 30, 1998

By Nate Thayer in Preah Vihear province

Pol Pot Last Day

Far Eastern Economic Review

Dying Breath

The inside story of Pol Pot's last days

and the disintegration of the movement he created

By Nate Thayer in Preah Vihear province

April 30, 1998

As Pol Pot's body lies bloating 100 metres away in a spartan shack, exhausted Khmer Rouge leaders gather in a jungle-shrouded ammunition depot filled with home-made mines and crude communications equipment. Explosions of heavy artillery and exchanges of automatic-weapons fire echo in the mountains as the Khmer Rouge's remaining guerrillas hold off government troops.

Ta Mok

Ta Mok, the movement's strongman, vows to fight on, and blames his longtime comrade-in-arms for the Khmer Rouge's desperate plight. "It is good that Pol Pot is dead. I feel no sorrow," he says. Then he levels a bizarre accusation against the rabidly nationalistic mass murderer: "Pol Pot was a Vietnamese agent. I have the documents."

A young Khmer Rouge fighter, his leaders only metres away, leans close to a visiting reporter and whispers in Khmer: "This movement is finished. Can you get me to America?"

Besieged in dense jungles along the Thai border, the remnants of the Khmer Rouge are battling for survival in the wake of three weeks of chaotic defections and the loss of their northern stronghold of Anlong Veng. Having lost faith in the harsh leadership of Ta Mok, several commanders are negotiating to defect to the guerrilla forces loyal to deposed Prime Minister Norodom Ranariddh.

Ta Mok's growing paranoia and isolation were only some of the revelations to come out of an exclusive tour of shrinking Khmer Rouge-held territory north of Anlong Veng the day after Pol Pot's death. Khmer Rouge cadres and Pol Pot's wife recounted the last, ignominious days of his life, as he was moved through the jungle to escape advancing troops.

 

Pol Pot

There was no visible evidence that the former Cambodian dictator was murdered. Cadres say he died of a heart attack on the night of April 15. In the days after his death, Khmer Rouge envoys held secret peace talks in Bangkok with Cambodian Defence Minister Tea Banh, and had their first direct contact with U.S. officials in more than two decades. Yet at the same time, Khmer Rouge holdouts were joining up with Ranariddh's rebel forces, making it likely that the insurgency will continue as Cambodia prepares for crucial elections in July.

The Khmer Rouge weren't trying to expose their shaky future when they allowed a REVIEW reporter to enter their territory, but to prove to the world that the architect of Cambodia's killing fields was indeed dead. Leading the way to Pol Pot's house to display the ultimate proof, a cadre warns against stepping off the path. "Be careful, there are mines everywhere."

The sickly-sweet stench of death fills the wooden hut. Fourteen hours have passed since Pol Pot's demise, and his body is decomposing in the tropical heat. His face and fingers are covered with purple blotches.

Khmer Rouge leaders insist that Pol Pot, aged 73, died of natural causes. Already visibly ill and professing to benear death when interviewed by the REVIEW in October, he had been weakened by a shortage of food and the strain of being moved around to escape the government offensive. "Pol Pot died of heart failure," Ta Mok says. "I did not kill him."

That night, Ta Mok had wanted to move Pol Pot to another house for security reasons. "He was sitting in his chair waiting for the car to come. But he felt tired. Pol Pot's wife asked him to take a rest. He lay down in his bed. His wife heard a gasp of air. It was the sound of dying. When she touched him he had passed away already. It was at 10:15 last night."

There are no signs of foul play, but Pol Pot has a pained expression on his face, as if he did not die peacefully. One eye is shut and the other half open. Cotton balls are stuffed up his nostrils to prevent leakage of body fluids. By his body lie his rattan fan, blue-and-red peasant scarf, bamboo cane and white plastic sandals. His books and other possessions have been confiscated since he was ousted by his comrades in an internal power struggle 10 months earlier. Two vases of purple bougainvillea stand at the head of the bed. Otherwise, the room is empty, save for a small short-wave radio.

Pol Pot listened religiously to Voice of America broadcasts on that radio, but the April 15 news on the Khmer-language service may have been too much to bear. The lead story was the REVIEW's report that Khmer Rouge leaders--desperate for food, medicine and international support--had decided to turn him over to an international tribunal to face trial for crimes against humanity. "He listened to VOA every night, and VOA on Wednesday reported your story at 8 p.m. that he would be turned over to an international court," says Gen. Khem Nuon, the Khmer Rouge army chief-of-staff. "We thought the shock of him hearing this on VOA might have killed him."

A week earlier, Nuon had said that Pol Pot knew of the decision, but now he says the ageing leader had not been fully informed. "We decided clearly to send him" to an international court, says Nuon, "but we only told him that we were in a very difficult situation and perhaps it was better that he go abroad. Tears came to his eyes when I told him that."

Perched nervously by the deathbed is Pol Pot's wife, a 40-year-old former ammunition porter for the Khmer Rouge named Muon. Clutching her hand is their 12-year-old daughter, Mul. A peasant woman, Muon says she has never laid eyes on a Westerner before. She corroborates Ta Mok's account of Pol Pot's death. "Last night, he said he felt dizzy. I asked him to lie down. I heard him make a noise. When I went to touch him, he had died."

Pol Pot married her after his first wife went insane in the 1980s as the Khmer Rouge tried to survive in the jungle after their reign of terror was ended by invading Vietnamese troops. Muon seems oblivious to her husband's bloodstained past, caught only in the anguish of the present.

"He told me a few weeks ago: 'My father died at 73. I am 73 now. My time is not far away,'" she says. "It was a way of telling me that he was preparing to die." Reaching down to caress his face, she bursts into tears. "He was always a good husband. He tried his best to educate the children not to be traitors. Since I married him in 1985, I never saw him do a bad thing."

Asked about his reputation as a mass-murderer, her lips quiver and she casts a terrified glance at senior Khmer Rouge cadres hovering nearby. "I know nothing about politics," she says. "It is up to history to judge. That is all I want to say."

She has reason to be terrified. "As to what I will do with his family, I haven't decided," says Ta Mok. "If I let them go, will they say anything bad about me? Maybe they might be used by Hun Sen," he says, referring to his nemesis, the Cambodian premier.

Outside the front door is a small vegetable garden tended by Pol Pot's wife and daughter; next to it, a freshly dug trench where Pol Pot and his family were forced to cower as artillery bombarded the jungle redoubt in recent weeks.

Pol Pot's last days were spent in flight and fear of capture--a humiliating end for the man who ruled Cambodia from 1975 to 1979. According to his wife and Khmer Rouge leaders, he dyed his hair black on April 10 in a desperate attempt to avoid capture by mutinying Khmer Rouge troops as he fled to the Dongrek mountains north of Anlong Veng. "Pol Pot feared that he could be caught. By dying his hair he was trying to disguise himself. For such a person to do that, it showed real fear in his mind," says Gen. Nuon.

The guerrillas had been unable to provide their ousted leader with sufficient food since being forced from their headquarters in late March. "For the last few weeks he had diarrhoea and we haven't had much food because of the fighting with the traitors," recounts Ta Mok.

As Pol Pot fled, the remnants of the movement he created 38 years ago crumbled before his eyes. A few days before his death, he was being driven with his wife and daughter to a new hideout by Gen. Non Nou, his personal guard. From his blue Toyota Land Cruiser, Pol Pot saw Khmer Rouge civilians--cadres say around 30,000--who had been forced from their fields and villages by government troops and Khmer Rouge defectors.

"When he saw the peasants and our cadres lying by the side of the road with no food or shelter, he broke down into tears," says Non Nou. His wife echoes the account, and quotes Pol Pot as saying: "My only wish is that Cambodians stay united so that Vietnam will not swallow our country." Pol Pot never expressed any regrets, she says. "What I would like the world to know was that he was a good man, a patriot, a good father."

Asked how she wanted her father remembered, Pol Pot's only child stands with her head bowed, eyes downcast and filled with tears. "Now my daughter is not able to say anything," interjects Muon. "I think she will let history judge her father."

History will have to, because death has deprived the world of the chance to judge the man responsible for the deaths of more than 1 million people.

 

Ieng Sary

Although Pol Pot has cheated justice, other leaders of that regime remain at large, including Khieu Samphan and Nuon Chea, who are sheltering with Ta Mok. Others, such as Keo Pok, Mam Nay and Pol Pot's former brother-in-law, Ieng Sary, have defected with their troops to the government side since 1996.

Although Pol Pot's life will stand as the darkest chapter in Cambodian history, his death is likely to be just a historical footnote. What's more likely to affect Cambodia's future is the continuing disintegration of the Khmer Rouge. This is prompting desperate attempts by what's left of the movement to find security.

The day after Pol Pot died, senior Khmer Rouge officials travelled to Bangkok, where they held secret negotiations with Cambodian Defence Minister Tea Banh. There, they offered for the first time to cooperate with elements of the Cambodian government. "Yes, we are prepared to negotiate. We are in the process," says Ta Mok. "But I am not going to be a running dog of Vietnam like Ieng Sary. In a nutshell, we want to dissolve the Hun Sen government and establish a national government that includes all national forces."

Interviewed on April 18, one of the chief Khmer Rouge negotiators, Cor Bun Heng, said of the unprecedented meeting: "It was a good beginning and cordial. But these things take time." Added the other senior negotiator, Gen. Nuon: "We believe that the only way out is national reconciliation between all the parties. We know that the entire Cambodian population wants peace."

What's more, Nuon and Cor Bun Heng said they met secretly on April 17 with American officials in Bangkok, and laid out their demands for a political settlement. It was the first official, direct contact between the United States and the Khmer Rouge for at least two decades. U.S. officials wouldn't comment.

In the jungles, Ta Mok knows that his capture and trial is sought by the international community. He wants to use Pol Pot's death to wipe the slate clean. "The world community should stop talking about this now that Pol Pot is dead. It was all Pol Pot. He annihilated many good cadres and destroyed our movement. I hope he suffers after death," he says. He then asks a visiting reporter to get hold of a satellite telephone for him, sketching a collapsible phone he has seen. "I want a good telephone. One that I can call anywhere in the world."

But working the phone will not prevent Ta Mok from rapidly losing the loyalty of his own commanders. Privately, many of his top officers and cadres hold him responsible for the collapse of the movement since he seized control from Pol Pot last July. "He is very tired," says a senior Khmer Rouge official. "No man can shoulder all the political, diplomatic and military burdens by himself." Others are less kind. "He has no more support from many of his own people," whispers one cadre. "But we don't know where to go. Cambodia has no good leaders."

Fear was in the faces of many leaders and cadres still holed up near the Thai border--and for good reason. "There may be more traitors, it is normal. But in the end they will all die," Ta Mok says. He's a man of his word: Three top commanders arrested with Pol Pot last year were executed in late March because some of the fighters who mutinied were loyal to them. "It was a decision made by the people," Ta Mok shrugs.

He gives the impression of being increasingly out of touch with reality, seeing enemies everywhere and unwilling to compromise. His brutal tactics are also a source of unease among his remaining loyalists. "Our movement will only get stronger. We have sent our forces close to Phnom Penh and they have carried out their tasks successfully," he says. The "task" he boasts of was the recent massacre of 22 ethnic Vietnamese, including women and children, in a fishing village in Kompong Chhnang province.

The REVIEW has learned that many of the estimated 1,600 guerrillas still nominally under Ta Mok's command have pledged allegiance to the forces loyal to Ranariddh's Funcinpec party, who occupy nearby jungles. Cadres say that in negotiations with Funcinpec's Gen. Nyek Bun Chhay, they have pledged loyalty to Ranariddh's party and agreed to force Ta Mok into "retirement."

Scores of uniformed Funcinpec troops, including senior commanders, are fighting alongside Ta Mok loyalists north of Anlong Veng. Gen. Meas Sarin, a Funcinpec commander and governor of Preah Vihear province before Hun Sen's coup in July, is present at Khmer Rouge headquarters. He says 600 Funcinpec troops are fighting government forces alongside Ta Mok's commanders. The heavy fighting nearby is audible during the interview.

This presents a political dilemma for Ranariddh. He has pledged to abide by a Japanese peace plan that aims to create conditions for Funcinpec to campaign freely ahead of the July elections--something Hun Sen has resisted. The Japanese plan specifically calls for the severing of links between Funcinpec troops and Ta Mok's guerrillas. For the moment, Ranariddh is choosing denial. "I do not have any cooperative relations with the Khmer Rouge," he said on April 17. "Rumours currently circulating to the effect that forces loyal to me are supporting the Khmer Rouge forces in Anlong Veng are not true."

That's not the only obstacle facing Japan and Asean as they try to find a formula that would allow Ranariddh to return home to campaign for the polls. The job was already hard enough for the Thai, Philippine and Indonesian foreign ministers who met King Norodom Sihanouk in Siem Riep in mid-April. But then Sihanouk made it harder by telling them Ranariddh should pull out of the elections--and Cambodian politics altogether--and instead prepare to be king, according to furious Funcinpec members.

Meanwhile, Cambodia's neighbours are becoming increasingly exasperated by the seemingly endless war. Interviewed in Bangkok, Thai Foreign Minister Surin Pitsuwan expresses optimism that elections could be held in Cambodia, but also voices a warning. "Without a resolution to the Cambodian conflict, the region is being perceived as insecure, unstable. That prevents further cooperation and development for Asia," he says, pointing to plans to develop the Mekong basin that are now delicately poised.

China, previously hesitant about taking part in the Mekong's development, is now willing to participate, Surin says. That means that Cambodia, at the heart of the Mekong Basin, is now the major remaining obstacle. "The region is being denied this development by the existing Cambodian conflict," says Surin. "Certainly, there is a sense of Cambodia fatigue in the international community. Cambodians should realize that."

---

Nate Thayer, winner of the 1998 ICIJ Award for Outstanding International Investigative Reporting, is the Southeast Asia correspondent for the Far Eastern Economic Review. In July 1997, after years of cultivating sources, Thayer was allowed in to the remote northern Cambodia field headquarters of the Khmer Rouge for a "people's tribunal" of their ousted former leader Pol Pot. Three months later, Thayer repeated his exclusive coverage, this time conducting the first interview with Pol Pot in 18 years. It was also the only interview before Pol Pot - blamed for the deaths of more than 1 million Cambodians between 1975 and 1978 - died.

Thayer, a native of Washington, D.C., had spent years cultivating sources in Thailand, Cambodia, and beyond, trying to track down the elusive Pol Pot. A contributor to Jane's Defence Weekly, The Associated Press, and more than 40 publications, Thayer began writing for the Far Eastern Economic Review in 1989 and made dozens of reporting trips into resistance-controlled Cambodia. The physical toll of his work included hospitalization 16 times for cerebral malaria and broken bones and shrapnel wounds after his truck hit an anti-tank mine.

Thayer's dogged reporting also earned him The World Press Award, the 1997 "Scoop of the Year" British press award, and the 1998 Francis Fox Wood Award for Courage in Journalism. While a 1996-1997 visiting scholar at the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University, Thayer received a grant to write a book on Cambodian politics, which will be published next year.

While the focus of Thayer's reporting has been Asia, he has also covered the former Yugoslavia, Albania, Cuba, and Mongolia. He continues to concentrate on international organized crime, narcotics trafficking, human rights, and areas of military conflict.

Report: Khmer Rouge collapse drove Pol Pot to tears

Report: Khmer Rouge collapse drove Pol Pot to tears

AP Online

April 23, 1998

BANGKOK, Thailand (AP) _ Pol Pot, the tyrannical leader of Cambodia's Khmer Rouge, broke down in tears when he realized his once-mighty guerrilla movement was on the brink of defeat, according to an account of his final days published Thursday.

Pol Pot died on April 15 in a small hut near the Thai border as Cambodian government troops were trying to finish off the remnants of the Khmer Rouge. The 73-year-old revolutionary died of a heart attack, said his comrades-turned-captors.

The account in the Hong Kong-based magazine Far Eastern Economic Review suggests the heart attack may have been brought on by hunger, lack of medical care, even shock - upon learning the Khmer Rouge was preparing to turn him over to an international tribunal for trial on genocide charges.

The account was written by U.S. journalist Nate Thayer, who last year became the first foreign journalist in 18 years to have an interview with the elusive Pol Pot. The interview occurred shortly after Pol Pot was deposed as head of the movement and placed under house arrest.

Pol Pot led the 1975-79 Khmer Rouge regime that through its radical Maoist-inspired policies caused the deaths of as many as 2 million Cambodians - either in mass executions or from starvation and disease. Since then, the Khmer Rouge has operated as a guerrilla army operating mostly from northern Cambodia.

Thayer quoted a Khmer Rouge military commander as saying Pol Pot died just hours after he learned of the plan to hand him over from a news broadcast by the Voice of America shortwave radio service.

``We thought the shock of him hearing this on VOA might have killed him,'' the commander, Khem Nuon, is quoted as saying.

Khem Nuon, the story noted, had told Thayer a different account a week earlier, saying Pol Pot had been informed of the decision to send him for trial and accepted it with revolutionary stoicism.

Now he claims they only told him ``we were in a very difficult situation and perhaps it was better that he go abroad. Tears came to his eyes when I told him that.''

Thayer wrote that the fighting which drove the Khmer Rouge from their northern Cambodian stronghold of Anlong Veng prevented the ailing revolutionary from receiving proper care.

``For the last few weeks he had diarrhea and we haven't had much food,'' the current Khmer Rouge leader, Ta Mok, was quoted as saying.

A few days before his death, Pol Pot dyed his gray hair black, suggesting he was afraid of being captured.

At one point, Pol Pot was able to glimpse the turmoil caused by the fighting as he and his wife and 12-year-old daughter were being driven from one shelter to another, his minder, Non Nou, was quoted as saying.

``When he saw the peasants and our cadres lying by the side of the road with no food or shelter, he broke down into tears,'' said Non Nou.

Pol Pot's 40-year-old widow, Muon, quoted him as saying ``My only wish is that Cambodians stay united so that Vietnam will not swallow our country.'' Vietnam drove the Khmer Rouge from power in 1979.

Ta Mok denied, as he has previously, speculation that he had Pol Pot killed.

The very night Pol Pot died, Ta Mok said, he had wanted to move him to another house for security reasons.

``He was sitting in his chair, waiting for the car to come. But he felt tired. Pol Pot's wife asked him to take a rest. He lay down in his bed. His wife heard a gasp of air. It was the sound of dying. When she touched him, he had passed away already.''


Copyright 1998 The Associated Press All Rights Reserved.

Pol Pot's World Ended With a Whimper; Khmer Rouge Chief Was Sick, Friendless, Frightened of Dying

Pol Pot's World Ended With a Whimper; Khmer Rouge Chief Was Sick, Friendless, Frightened of Dying

The Washington Post

April 23, 1998 | Keith B. Richburg

Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot, the architect of Cambodia's killing fields, spent his final days sick, hungry and fearful of dying, according to new details emerging from the Cambodian jungle.

He was suffering from diarrhea. He cried at the sight of the troops he once commanded collapsing along the roadside. And he could hear the sound of government artillery moving ever closer to his jungle redoubt -- sometimes forcing him and his wife to cower in a freshly dug trench just outside their small wooden hut.

A final indignity came when Pol Pot learned on the Voice of America's Cambodian language broadcast that his former colleagues were negotiating to turn him over to an international tribunal to face genocide charges. Pol Pot heard the news at 8 p.m. on April 15. Two hours and 15 minutes later, he was dead, apparently of a heart attack, his comrades and wife said. These new insights into Pol Pot's final days have emerged in a detailed article in today's Far Eastern Economic Review written by correspondent Nate Thayer, a Cambodia expert who has spent the last decade reporting on the elusive Khmer Rouge guerrilla movement and who last year became the first reporter to interview Pol Pot in nearly two decades. Thayer's account -- based on hours of interviews with Pol Pot's 40-year-old wife, Muon, and the new hard-line Khmer Rouge leader, Ta Mok -- paint an extraordinary picture of the enigmatic Pol Pot's physical and mental deterioration. Perhaps most striking is that the Khmer Rouge leader deemed responsible for the deaths of an estimated 1.5 million to 1.7 million Cambodians expressed fear about his own demise. " `My father died at 73,' " his wife quoted Pol Pot as saying. " `I am 73 now. My time is not far away.' " Ta Mok, a one-legged guerrilla commander known as "the Butcher," told Thayer: "He wanted to live. He took medicine all the time. He wanted to live. He did not want to die, but he had lost everything, and he was old." Other Khmer Rouge leaders described Pol Pot's distress recently, when he looked out the window of a four-wheel drive vehicle as he was being driven away from a jungle battlefield and saw guerrillas he once commanded lying along the road without food or shelter. "He broke down in tears," said Gen. Noun Nou, who was driving the vehicle. Muon, Pol Pot's wife, said: "He saw the people lying on the ground and he cried." Pol Pot then told her: " `My only wish is that the Cambodians stay united, so that Vietnam will not swallow our country.' " From the new accounts, Pol Pot's final days were those of a man hunted -- and clearly afraid of being caught, particularly by Cambodian government troops whom he saw as puppets of Vietnam, historically a foe of Cambodia. There was little food available once the government offensive forced the rebels from their base at Anlong Veng, said Khmer Rouge officials. "For the last few weeks he had diarrhea, and we haven't had much food because of the fighting," Ta Mok said. On April 10, five days before his death, Pol Pot dyed his gray hair black to fool Khmer Rouge troops who had mutinied and were fighting on the side of government forces. "For a person to do that, it showed real fear in his mind," Khmer Rouge military chief of staff Khem Nuon was quoted as saying. At one point, Khmer Rouge leaders, including Ta Mok, told Pol Pot that he might have to leave Cambodia, and tears reportedly welled in the former dictator's eyes. Their intention was to turn Pol Pot over to an international tribunal to gain new respectability. Khmer Rouge officials even asked Thayer's advice on how to turn over Pol Pot, since they had no contact with the United States or other Western countries or groups. Thayer suggested they approach the International Committee of the Red Cross. But Pol Pot apparently was led to believe that he would be sent into asylum overseas, not turned over for trial. It appears he discovered the truth on Wednesday, April 15, when he tuned in his shortwave radio -- one of the few possessions he had left -- to the 8 p.m. Cambodian language news broadcast of the Voice of America. "He listened to VOA every night," Khem Nuon told Thayer in an interview in the jungle, "and VOA on Wednesday reported your story at 8 p.m., that he would be turned over to an international court. We thought the shock of hearing this on VOA might have killed him." Thayer was the first journalist invited across the Cambodian border from Thailand last Thursday to see the body -- which he said seemed to wear a pained expression, with one eye shut and the other half open. But Thayer said he looked closely at the body, even poking it, and saw no outward evidence of foul play. The Khmer Rouge, though, were eager to prove to the world that Pol Pot died a natural death. "I did not kill him," Ta Mok insisted. "He was sitting in his chair, waiting for the car to come. But he felt tired. Pol Pot's wife asked him to take a rest. He lay down in his bed. His wife heard a gasp of air. It was the sounds of dying. When she touched him, he had already passed away." Thayer said in an interview that he was well aware of Pol Pot's health problems, because the guerrilla leader had listed them in their October meeting. Pol Pot told Thayer he suffered from a heart condition and serious respiratory problems. Thayer recalled that at the time Pol Pot could walk only a few feet before "he was literally gasping for breath." Thayer said that in February, during another trip he made to the Khmer Rouge-held jungle of northern Cambodia, he carried with him heart medicine that the Khmer Rouge had requested for Pol Pot. "I brought the medicine in, and I delivered it to the Khmer Rouge leadership to give to Pol Pot," Thayer said. But Thayer needed some forensic evidence to take back to Thailand -- evidence that the body was indeed that of Pol Pot and that could perhaps provide clues to the cause of death. So Thayer decided he needed Pol Pot's false front teeth. "The teeth is what I was going after," Thayer said. "We knew that his two front teeth were false, and there aren't any dentists in Cambodia so there had to be dental records somewhere. If I came out with the two front teeth off the corpse and they matched, there'd be no question that was Pol Pot." "They agreed to give me the teeth," Thayer said. "The wife was a little freaked out -- she didn't like the idea. . . .The wife looked at me like I was nuts." The Khmer Rouge leaders later changed their minds about the teeth after more journalists poured over the border. Ta Mok and other Khmer Rouge leaders said they hope Pol Pot's death will allow the group to rehabilitate its image and shed its murderous reputation. "Pol Pot has nothing to do with our movement," Ta Mok said. "It is Pol Pot who caused trouble to our movement. Without Pol Pot, our movement might not be like it is today."

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The most evil man in the world is dead: The Independent (London, England)

The most evil man in the world is dead

The Independent (London, England)

April 17, 1998 | Stephen Vines in Hong Kong

POL POT, the Cambodian dictator whose name is synonymous with genocide, is dead. The man responsible for the killing, torture and starvation of over one million of his people, died peacefully following a heart attack.

There was confusion at first over whether reports of his death were true. But it now seems clear that he died late on Wednesday in a Cambodian village two miles from the border with Thailand. His body was shown to a group of journalists yesterday. They included the American reporter Nate Thayer, who has interviewed Pol Pot twice recently and is convinced that the dead man is the former dictator.

After causing havoc in his lifetime by plunging Cambodia into one of the most disastrous experiments in social engineering the world has seen, his death at the age of 76 was prosaic. Dressed in baggy grey trousers and an off-white, short-sleeved cotton shirt his body was laid out in a simple hut reeking of formaldehyde. Teenage Khmer Rouge soldiers, who resembled those who carried him to power for four bloody years, starting in 1975, guarded the body. Before he died, they had been his captors. According to reports earlier in the week the rump of the Khmer Rouge had been planning to turn him over for international trial in a last attempt to save their own skins from advancing Cambodian government forces. Pol Pot died deserted by his erstwhile comrades-in-arms in their last stronghold. Having inspired terror in Cambodia, he had become an entirely marginal figure. As if to emphasise the isolation facing the Khmer Rouge, the only sound to be heard while Pol Pot lay at rest was the rumble of fighting between Khmer Rouge and government troops. There is no suggestion of foul play in Pol Pot's death. Since he was arrested by his own troops last year he has been ill. The Cambodian government spokesman, Khieu Kahnarith, said the state wanted to conduct a medical investigation but thought it unlikely that the former dictator had been killed. Non Nou, the Khmer Rouge commander responsible for Pol Pot's security, said: "If they are afraid the body was tampered with, ask his wife. She was there". It is unlikely that there will be much mourning for Pol Pot. Cambodia's King, Norodom Sihanouk, who twice allied himself with the Khmer Rouge, recently called him "one of the most horrible monsters ever created". Known as "Brother Number One"' during the years of his rule, Pol Pot may have been responsible for the deaths of one-fifth of Cambodia's population. Researchers believe as many as 1.7 million people died as a result of executions, torture and mass starvation. Pol Pot received his higher education in France and acquired a reputation there as an amiable, fun-loving student. It was in France that he also became acquainted with Marxism and back in his homeland he built up the revolutionary movement which overthrew Lon Nol's regime in 1975. The movement he helped to create is now largely decimated. It helped create the current government led by Hun Sen, a former Khmer Rouge commander who is also no stranger to using violence for political ends.

IS IT POL POT?; Mystery over evil killer's last picture.

 

IS IT POL POT?; Mystery over evil killer's last picture.

The Mirror (London, England)

April 17, 1998 | Dowdney, Mark

1

EVEN in death Pol Pot, the butcher of Cambodia, held the world in suspense.

The evil tyrant, whose Killing Fields reign claimed up to two million lives, was reportedly found dead yesterday in his remote jungle hideout. The picture on the right was produced as evidence. But the grey hair revealed at Pol Pot's show trial in Cambodia last year has now turned dark.

And last night there were demands for positive proof that the 73-year- old dictator had not faked his death to escape justice.

Cambodia's Embassy in Paris said Pol Pot had been reported dead many times before and warned that yesterday's reports had not been confirmed by "trustworthy sources." The body identified as

Pol Pot lay on a mattress in a hut in northern Cambodia.

The only independent witness allowed to see it - American journalist Nate Thayer - insisted it WAS the deposed Khmer Rouge leader.

Thayer, who works for the Far Eastern Economic Review and is one of the few Westerners to meet Pol Pot, took photographs of the corpse.

He said last night: "There is no question that this is Pol Pot."

Cambodian diplomats in New York said the tyrant may have dyed his hair as a disguise in recent months when international pressure mounted to put him on trial for genocide.

The US State Department said Washington had no independent confirmation that Pol Pot was dead, but added that it had no reason to doubt the "compelling" photographic evidence.

IS POL POT REALLY DEAD?; Mystery of Killing Fields tyrant who massacred 2m.

IS POL POT REALLY DEAD?; Mystery of Killing Fields tyrant who massacred 2m.

Daily Record (Glasgow, Scotland)

April 17, 1998 | Dowdney, Mark

Claims that evil tyrant Pol Pot had died were thrown into doubt last night.

The Khmer Rouge insisted the body they put on show was his.

But observers questioned its resemblance to the 73-year-old dictator, who was filmed nine months ago.

They also pointed out the stark difference in hair colour -with Pot's hair apparently DARKENING as he got older.

During his 18 years hidden in the jungle, the cunning monster was also reported dead several times - only to reappear.

Blood-soaked Pot, responsible for the deaths of two million of his own people in Cambodia's infamous Killing Fields, was due to be put on trial by the West for genocide.

The Cambodian Embassy in Paris expressed doubts over his death - and said it could have been faked to cheat justice.

An official embassy statement read: "We warn public opinion against this news which is not confirmed by trustworthy sources."

The embassy added that "it could not be ruled out once again that the death has been orchestrated to end the hunt to bring him to trial".

America's State Department could offer no conclusive evidence either.

Spokesman James Rubin said Washington had no independent confirmation.

Cambodia's present leaders also found it hard to accept that he was finally dead.

Officials insisted his body should be viewed by more independent witnesses -as well as being checked for poison.

However, others are convinced Pot is dead. Only one independent witness was allowed to see the body yesterday, American journalist Nate Thayer.

He said: "There is no question that this is Pol Pot and that he is dead."

Thayer, who works for the Far Eastern Economic Review, took photographs in the hut where the body lay.

He is one of the few Westerners who has met Pot before.

Thayer attended Pot's show trial last year, staged by the dictator's former comrades.

Meanwhile, the Cambodian Mission in New York put forward a theory for the difference in hair colour.

An official said: "We believe he dyed it to avoid recognition."

Pot is said to have died from a heart attack.

But another theory is that he was murdered because he knew too many secrets, which would have come out at the genocide trial.

China and Thailand feared what he might say about their secret support for his evil regime.

Youk Chhang, who is gathering evidence against top Khmer Rouge leaders, said: "I think we could almost have arrested him tomorrow, it was very close."

He said countries like Thailand and China must be "relieved."

Pot's own men, still at bay in the jungles of northern Cambodia, also knew they would remain outcasts if the horrors they oversaw in the 70s were raked over at a trial.

Former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger voiced the suspicions of many yesterday in blaming the Khmer Rouge for the death. He said: "I don't exclude they did it to avoid having to hand him over for trial. If they refused, they would have been outlawed even more."

The exact truth may never be known -but Cambodians are angry that Pot has never answered for his crimes.

It would be a grim irony if the man whose savagery rivalled that of Stalin and Hitler died peacefully in his own bed, as the Khmer Rouge claim.

Chey Sopheara, director of Phnom Penh's genocide museum, said: "If he is really dead, he will be judged in hell.

"I regret it is now too late to bring him to justice. The West should not have delayed arresting him from 1979 to now.

"How can we find justice now for those millions of people who died during his rule?"

Kim Saren lost her parents, five brothers and four sisters to Pot's regime.

She said: "He deserved to die. I am only sorry that he died so easily without being tried."

The body was put on display for a small group of Western journalists who reached the remote spot near the Thai border.

It was lying on a bed wearing trousers and a shirt, and partly covered by a green sheet.

A few flowers lay around its head and the hut reeked of preserving fluid.

The body was guarded by teenage guerrillas armed with AK-47s.

Pot had been under house arrest since he was denounced by his own supporters last year and toppled from power.

His jailer, General Noun Nou, said the body was due to be cremated according to Khmer tradition. That would also destroy any evidence.

Nou said: "His wife came to us at midnight. She learned that her husband was dead when she was tying his mosquito net for him."

He denied Pot was murdered, adding: "If they are afraid the body was tampered with, ask his wife. She was there. No one has done anything like that.

"His death is good for the Khmer Rouge. I hope his bad name will vanish with his death."

Pot's reign of terror was portrayed in the 1984 Oscar-winning film The Killing Fields.

American journalist Sidney Schanberg wrote the book which was turned into the movie, based on his horrific experiences. He was played by actor Sam Waterston.

Schanberg yesterday said the only sad thing about the reports of Pot's death was that he didn't face trial.

The journalist added: "He didn't think of himself as a killer. But he knew what he was doing. He had to know the bodies were piling up."

Cambodia and its people have never recovered from the atrocities he committed. The skulls of his victims, on public display in huge heaps, still cry for vengeance, say Cambodians.

After seizing power in 1975, Pot sealed Cambodia off from the rest of the world.

He was described by the king he ousted as "one of the most powerful monsters ever created by humanity".

The communist hardliner turned his country into a vast slave labour camp.

Pot's aim was to "start again" and return Cambodia to what he called Year Zero, with no Western influences.

The population of Phnom Penh - those who survived the death squads - were ordered into the countryside to work in the fields. They included the old, the sick, even toddlers. No one was spared.

Anyone who resisted was "re- educated". Even those who wore glasses were massacred.

Survivors recall being told by the Khmer Rouge troops: "Keeping you is no loss. Losing you is no loss."

Pot's torturers killed at least 18,000 people in Toul Sleng, the notorious jail in Phnom Penh where the gutters ran red with blood.

Amnesty International are now calling for Pot's fellow leaders to be caught and punished. A spokesman said: "Pol Pot was not the only architect of Cambodia's Killing Fields.

"He may have died but many other senior Khmer Rouge cadres remain free. They should not be allowed to also escape punishment."

Despite the horrors, Pot never apologised for his crimes.

When his mad reign was forcibly ended by the North Vietnamese in 1979, he simply slipped away into the jungles with his men and remained hidden.

Last year, in the only interview he ever gave while on the run, Pot said: "I would like to say my conscience is clear.

"Everything I have done and contributed is first for the nation and the people and race of Cambodia."

THEIR HANDS WERE STAINED WITH BLOOD

POL POT was one of long line of despots who stained the pages of history with the blood of their victims.

GENGHIS KHAN struck terror eight centuries ago and his name is still a byword for savagery. The Mongol warlord massacred the populations of city after city.

Historians now believe JOSEPH STALIN was responsible for the deaths of around 20million people in the Soviet Union. Many died in camps or in mass purges.

ADOLF HITLER was the twisted architect of the Final Solution. Six million Jews were put to death, many from countries conquered by Hitler's ruthless war machine. He also ordered the execution of many of his opponents within Germany in the 30s and 40s.

IDI AMIN'S reign of terror in Uganda, from a coup in 1971 until he fled in 1979, saw the deaths of up to 500,000 people. He is said to have taken pleasure in throwing personal foes to the crocodiles.

Iraq's SADDAM HUSSEIN, like many despots before him, claims to have the support of his people.

But he stands accused of the deaths of thousands of Kurds and Iranians in chemical warfare attacks.

IS IT POL POT?; Mystery over evil killer's last picture: EVEN in death Pol Pot, the butcher of Cambodia, held the world in suspense.

IS IT POL POT?; Mystery over evil killer's last picture

The Mirror (London, England)

April 17, 1998 | Dowdney, Mark

EVEN in death Pol Pot, the butcher of Cambodia, held the world in suspense.

The evil tyrant, whose Killing Fields reign claimed up to two million lives, was reportedly found dead yesterday in his remote jungle hideout. The picture on the right was produced as evidence. But the grey hair revealed at Pol Pot's show trial in Cambodia last year has now turned dark.

And last night there were demands for positive proof that the 73-year- old dictator had not faked his death to escape justice.

Cambodia's Embassy in Paris said Pol Pot had been reported dead many times before and warned that yesterday's reports had not been confirmed by "trustworthy sources." The body identified as

Pol Pot lay on a mattress in a hut in northern Cambodia.

The only independent witness allowed to see it - American journalist Nate Thayer - insisted it WAS the deposed Khmer Rouge leader.

Thayer, who works for the Far Eastern Economic Review and is one of the few Westerners to meet Pol Pot, took photographs of the corpse.

He said last night: "There is no question that this is Pol Pot."

Cambodian diplomats in New York said the tyrant may have dyed his hair as a disguise in recent months when international pressure mounted to put him on trial for genocide.

The US State Department said Washington had no independent confirmation that Pol Pot was dead, but added that it had no reason to doubt the "compelling" photographic evidence.

COPYRIGHT 2009 MGN LTD. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights or concerns about this content should be directed to Customer Service. For permission to reuse this article, contact Copyright Clearance Center.

Pol Pot Dead: NPR All Things Considered

Pol Pot Dead

NPR All Things Considered

April 16, 1998 

Linda Wertheimer, Robert Seigel  

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ROBERT SIEGEL, HOST: This is ALL THINGS CONSIDERED. I'm Robert Siegel.

LINDA WERTHEIMER, HOST: And I'm Linda Wertheimer.

Pol Pot, the leader of the Cambodian Khmer Rouge movement, is dead. He was 73 years old. His political movement, the Khmer Rouge, was responsible for the deaths of more than a million-and-a-half Cambodians.

Pol Pot's regime controlled Cambodia to 1975 to 1979, and eliminated all those who stood in the way of creating a agrarian Marxist state. But the Khmer Rouge was forced from power after a Vietnamese invasion. The group was essentially broken into factions.

And last year, Pol Pot was tried by his former comrades as a rival took control of what remained of the Khmer Rouge.

In the last year, the United Nations and the United States had revived an effort to formally hold Pol Pot responsible for the genocide that occurred in the killing fields of Cambodia.

Nate Thayer, the Southeast Asia correspondent for the "Far Eastern Economic Review," first interviewed Pol Pot in October 1997.

It was the first interview the leader had given to a western journalist in 18 years.

Earlier today, members of the Khmer Rouge took Thayer to see the body of Pol Pot at a camp near the Ti border. He confirmed that the body being displayed was indeed Pol Pot.

NATE THAYER, SOUTHEAST ASIA CORRESPONDENT, "FAR EASTERN ECONOMIC REVIEW" : There is no question that I saw the body of Pol Pot, it was Pol Pot, and that he is dead. There is not question of that. There is questions raised on, of course, how he died. They say he died from heart failure. In fact, it's logical. I tend to believe it. But really without forensics it's impossible and of course there is speculation that he was the victim of a political murder.

WERTHEIMER: The reason that the news of his death has been received with some skepticism in Southeast Asia and here is that the United States has been interested in trying to arrest Pol Pot and has been working with China to try to do that and felt, I believe, that that was a possibility, that it was coming close, and then he dies.

THAYER: That's right. There was movement and significant movement that the remnants of the Khmer Rouge were now willing to turn Pol Pot over for proceedings in front of an international tribunal for crimes against humanity.

Now, Pol Pot's health has been extremely frail for a long time.

For the last 20 days or so he has been taken through the jungles as they've lost much of their territory. Today, while I was in the Khmer Rouge area, there was very heavy fighting very close by both incoming and outgoing artillery and small arms fire. There were regular mine explosions. The trauma of an elderly, extremely frail, probably very demoralized man under these conditions very easily could have prompted a heart attack, which is what they -- his wife, who I interviewed this afternoon, claims happened last night.

WERTHEIMER: Does the death of Pol Pot change anything for Cambodia? Is he still significant enough a figure that it changes the equation there?

THAYER: You know it's a very good question because, in fact, Pol Pot has been held up as the boogie man lurking in the jungles. But in fact he's been purged from any political role for some time.

And along with Pol Pot's death, unfortunately, goes the chance of finding out really what happened and why. There's so many unanswered questions of why so many people suffered so unspeakably and so unfairly. And this man was in sole control.

But the fact is that there are thousands of people who are guilty of crimes against humanity who continue to wield power in Cambodia' s mainstream politics today: the current prime minister, the defense minister, the interior minister, the finance minister, the justice minister, hundreds of generals in the military and security forces.

And these are people whose government is recognized and supported by the United States, among others.

Much of the United States' so-called quest for Pol Pot is really Washington politics. The fact is that there are mass murderers who are in power who are being issued diplomatic visas and have free run of the country today.

And maybe the death of Pol Pot will refocus really where it should be, in my view, which is that Cambodia is a country that is really on its knees, and whose people continue to suffer under despotic leaders 20 years after Pol Pot was driven from power.

WERTHEIMER: Thanks very much, Nate Thayer.

THAYER: OK, thank you very much.

WERTHEIMER: Nate Thayer is a correspondent for the "Far Eastern Economic Review." This is a rush transcript. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

Transcribed by Federal Document Clearing House, Inc. under license from National Public Radio, Inc. Formatting copyright (c) 1998 Federal Document Clearing House, Inc. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to National Public Radio, Inc. This transcript may not be reproduced in whole or in part without prior written permission. For further information please contact NPR's Business Affairs at (202) 414-2954

Pol Pot's Really Dead-NPR

Pol Pot's Really Dead

NPR Morning Edition

April 16, 1998

NateThayer, Susan Stamberg    

00-00-0000
SUSAN STAMBERG, HOST: This is MORNING EDITION. I'm Susan Stamberg in for Bob Edwards.

Pol Pot, the former leader of Cambodia's Khmer Rouge, is dead.

Pol Pot led a movement that killed, starved or worked to death some two million people between 1975 and 1979. After a power struggle last year, he was put under house arrest, and his followers have been on the run in recent months in the jungles of the Thailand-Cambodia border. And it is there that he died last night.

Nate Thayer is on the line with us from the Thai-Cambodian border. Mr. Thayer reports for the Far Eastern Economic Review.

You were shown a body today. And people claim that it is the body of Pol Pot. Tell us -- describe the scene for us.

NATE THAYER, REPORTER, FAR EASTERN ECONOMIC REVIEW: Well, there is no question that Pol Pot died. He died last night. He died apparently of heart failure as the direct cause, but also clearly contributing causes of fleeing through the jungles for the last 20 days as the government has taken much of the Khmer Rouge area. We were brought to Pol Pot's house. Pol Pot was lying in a bed, a very spartan room. He had some very crude temporary embalming techniques. And he was dead. There's no question that Pol Pot, the leader of the Khmer Rouge for the last 38 years, died about 16 hours ago.

STAMBERG: Who was it who brought you to that house?

THAYER: We were brought into the jungles of northern Cambodia, into some of the last jungle enclaves of the remnants of the Khmer Rouge. We were met and spent several hours with Ta Mok, the leader of the rump of the Khmer Rouge guerrilla forces. It was his soldiers who brought us to the house of Pol Pot, a house that was surrounded by mine fields. It had newly dug trenches.

There was heavy fighting going on near -- in nearby front lines. And we met both his wife and his daughter and saw the body of Pol Pot, which is -- will be cremated, they say, in about 48 hours.

STAMBERG: What was -- what's the last time that you saw Pol Pot, Mr. Thayer? THAYER: A few months ago, I was the journalist who attended the people's tribunal of Pol Pot when he was purged because of internal disputes last July. I then interviewed him at length several months ago and then again went in just a number of weeks ago. We knew Pol Pot was very sick. Clearly, the trauma of the advancing government forces, which had forced the Khmer Rouge out of their productive zones and into these very rugged jungles and mountain escarpments along the Thai border, probably was a significant contributing factor to Pol Pot's demise last night, which is claimed to be through heart disease. His wife told us that he was feeling dizzy and laid down, and he -- she heard him gasp and went over, and when she touched him he was dead. And that was at 10:45 p.m. Cambodian time last night, about 16 hours ago.

STAMBERG: And dead at the age of 73. How would you describe what Pol Pot's legacy is, Mr. Thayer?

THAYER: Well, there's no question that Pol Pot caused unspeakable suffering to millions of people who didn't deserve it.

And there's no question that his death leaves really many unanswered historical questions as well. He went to his grave believing that he had contributed more to his country than the suffering that he inflicted. Pol Pot was considered to be a patriot and a nationalist fighting a historical enemy by those who supported him. And he refused to the end to take responsibility for the terrible, terrible reign of three years in the late 1970s that crippled his country, the effects we still see today.

STAMBERG: Thank you very much, sir.

Nate Thayer of the "Far Eastern Economic Review," speaking with us from the Thai-Cambodian border.

This is a rush transcript. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated.

Transcribed by Federal Document Clearing House, Inc. under license from National Public Radio, Inc. Formatting copyright (c) 1998 Federal Document Clearing House, Inc. All rights reserved. No quotes from the materials contained herein may be used in any media without attribution to National Public Radio, Inc. This transcript may not be reproduced in whole or in part without prior written permission. For further information please contact NPR's Business Affairs at (202) 414-2954

Khmer Rouge wants Pol Pot to face war crime trial.

Khmer Rouge wants Pol Pot to face war crime trial.

Daily Mail (London)

April 15, 1998

LEADERS of the Khmer Rouge want to hand deposed dictator Pol Pot to an international tribunal to stand trial for war crimes against the Cambodian people.

They want to surrender their 73-year-old former leader in exchange for food and medicine, according to the Hong Kong-based Far Eastern Economic Review.

Executions, forced labour and disease killed up to two million Cambodians from 1975, when Pol Pot's forces captured the capital Phnom Penh, to 1979, when the Khmer Rouge was defeated by invading Vietnamese forces. The Khmer Rouge has been opposing the government army from its jungle camps ever since.

Pol Pot has been held under house arrest close to the Thai border since June last year when he was overthrown in an internal power struggle. There have been calls for him to be brought before the International Court of Justice in The Hague to stand trial for crimes against humanity.

General Khem Nuon of the Khmer Rouge reportedly asked reporter Nat Thayer to put him in touch with 'the right people' so a handover could be arranged.

Thayer is said to have suggested they contact the International Committee of the Red Cross.

Magazine says Khmer Rouge leaders wants to surrender Pol Pot

Magazine says Khmer Rouge leaders wants to surrender Pol Pot

AP Online

April 14, 1998

HONG KONG (AP) _ Cambodia's Khmer Rouge officials have told a Hong Kong-based magazine they want to hand their former leader Pol Pot over to an international tribunal.

Meanwhile, Cambodia's army says it has trapped remaining Khmer Rouge forces in the mountains near the Thai border, and is poised to finish them off.

The Far Eastern Economic Review reported in its latest issue that the Khmer Rouge rebels have asked Review correspondent Nate Thayer for advice on how to deliver the notorious Pol Pot to the authorities.

Gen. Khem Nuon reportedly made the request Saturday during an interview with Thayer at the Thai-Cambodian border.

Khmer Rouge forces have held Pol Pot, 73, under house arrest since June, when they ousted him in a bloody internal power struggle.

Thayer interviewed Pol Pot last year after attending a communist-style ``People's Tribunal'' where the rebels denounced the former leader.

Gen. Nuon reportedly said the Khmer Rouge was unable to contact the United Sates or other countries, and asked Thayer to put them in contact with the ``right people.''

Thayer suggested they contact the International Committee of the Red Cross, the report said.

Pol Pot and his Khmer Rouge captured the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh in 1975 and ruled Cambodia until 1979, presiding over the deaths of an estimated 2 million people. A Vietnamese invasion in 1979 forced the Khmer Rouge to retreat back to the jungle.

There have been calls for Pol Pot to be brought before the International Court of Justice in the Hague to stand trial for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The rebels hope handing Pol Pot to the authorities will bring food, medicine and other international support for the beleaguered Khmer Rouge.

According to Cambodian military sources, the army is currently hammering the Khmer Rouge guerillas near their former mountain stronghold along the Thai border.

Reports indicate Khmer Rouge head Ta Mok and an undetermined number of hard-line guerillas are holed up in the jungle peaks and attempting a last desperate stand.

Most of the government forces are made up of Khmer Rouge defectors, who oppose their former comrades' refusal to strike a peace deal with Phnom Penh.

Some 5,000 defectors are waiting out the fighting 25 miles south of the battle zone. The government said they will send them and their families home when it is safe.

Magazine says Khmer Rouge leaders wants to surrender Pol Pot

Magazine says Khmer Rouge leaders wants to surrender Pol Pot

AP Online

April 14, 1998

1

AP Online
04-14-1998
HONG KONG (AP) _ Cambodia's Khmer Rouge officials have told a Hong Kong-based magazine they want to hand their former leader Pol Pot over to an international tribunal.

Meanwhile, Cambodia's army says it has trapped remaining Khmer Rouge forces in the mountains near the Thai border, and is poised to finish them off.

The Far Eastern Economic Review reported in its latest issue that the Khmer Rouge rebels have asked Review correspondent Nate Thayer for advice on how to deliver the notorious Pol Pot to the authorities.

Gen. Khem Nuon reportedly made the request Saturday during an interview with Thayer at the Thai-Cambodian border.

Khmer Rouge forces have held Pol Pot, 73, under house arrest since June, when they ousted him in a bloody internal power struggle.

Thayer interviewed Pol Pot last year after attending a communist-style ``People's Tribunal'' where the rebels denounced the former leader.

Gen. Nuon reportedly said the Khmer Rouge was unable to contact the United Sates or other countries, and asked Thayer to put them in contact with the ``right people.''

Thayer suggested they contact the International Committee of the Red Cross, the report said.

Pol Pot and his Khmer Rouge captured the Cambodian capital of Phnom Penh in 1975 and ruled Cambodia until 1979, presiding over the deaths of an estimated 2 million people. A Vietnamese invasion in 1979 forced the Khmer Rouge to retreat back to the jungle.

There have been calls for Pol Pot to be brought before the International Court of Justice in the Hague to stand trial for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The rebels hope handing Pol Pot to the authorities will bring food, medicine and other international support for the beleaguered Khmer Rouge.

According to Cambodian military sources, the army is currently hammering the Khmer Rouge guerillas near their former mountain stronghold along the Thai border.

Reports indicate Khmer Rouge head Ta Mok and an undetermined number of hard-line guerillas are holed up in the jungle peaks and attempting a last desperate stand.

Most of the government forces are made up of Khmer Rouge defectors, who oppose their former comrades' refusal to strike a peace deal with Phnom Penh.

Some 5,000 defectors are waiting out the fighting 25 miles south of the battle zone. The government said they will send them and their families home when it is safe.


Copyright 1998 The Associated Press All Rights Reserved.

A LIST OF THIS YEAR'S PEABODY AWARD WINNERS.(ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT)

Recently viewed: Article: Peabody winner rejects award for Pol Pot story

A LIST OF THIS YEAR'S PEABODY AWARD WINNERS.(ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT)

Albany Times Union (Albany, NY)

April 3, 1998

Byline: Associated Press

Winners of the 1997 George Foster Peabody Awards:

......``The Trial of Pol Pot,'' ABC News/Nightline, exclusive video by correspondent Nate Thayer in Cambodia with background and context by Ted Koppel and ``Nightline'' staff.