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Indochina Chronicle 51-52; Sept.- Nov. 1976 "Underdevelopment in Cambodia"

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The New York Times

The lede | the economist behind the khmer rouge.

The Economist Behind the Khmer Rouge

Updated | 2:59 p.m. As my colleague Seth Mydans reports from Phnom Penh, four senior members of the Khmer Rouge appeared before a war-crimes tribunal in the Cambodian capital on Monday, charged with responsibility for policies that caused the death of as much as one-fourth of the population in the late 1970s.

One of those former leaders is Khieu Samphan , a 79-year-old economist with a doctorate from the Sorbonne, who was Cambodia’s nominal head of state when the Khmer Rouge implemented its plan to radically transform the country’s society and economy.

Since he was one of the chief architects of the Khmer Rouge project, some observers have argued that Khieu Samphan’s 1959 doctoral dissertation, “Cambodia’s Economy and Industrial Development,” foreshadowed the radical agrarian nightmare to come.

Part of the dissertation was published, in English, by an academic journal in Berkeley in 1976. According to that translation , more than a decade before office workers were driven from Phnom Penh at gunpoint to perform forced agricultural labor in the countryside, the young economist in Paris argued that the kind of work done in Cambodia’s cities by bureaucrats, merchants and bankers was “unproductive.”

In his analysis of Cambodia’s economic structure, Khieu Samphan wrote:

these branches of activity add no value to the society from the perspective of the economy as a whole. They simply profit from a transfer of value issuing from other productive activities within society (agriculture, crafts, small industry). And the transfer of produce within society does not enlarge the total value of production obtained by society in any way. The distinction made by the Scottish economist Adam Smith between productive and unproductive work deserves to be carefully considered here. This is far from saying, for example, that a civil servant or a soldier would be useless to society. However, the greater the reduction in numbers of individuals concerned with general social organization, the greater the number who can contribute to production and the faster the enrichment of the nation.

While the distinction between productive and unproductive labor in Khieu Samphan’s dissertation was not original — it came from Adam Smith and was the subject of a famous critique by Karl Marx — the dry language of that part of the dissertation is somewhat chilling to read in retrospect, knowing that so many Cambodians were subsequently worked to death in the fields.

As Sophal Ear, an expert on post-conflict reconstruction, explained in a study of Cambodia’s economy that discusses Khieu Samhan’s dissertation, after the Khmer Rouge took power in 1975:

The economy underwent massive restructuring; all money was virtually banned and banks were closed. Markets were all but destroyed. All who had lived in the cities were now to work in the countryside…. The leaders of the Khmer Rouge movement, Saloth Sar (better known to the world by his nom de guerre Pol Pot) and Sorbonne-educated economist Khieu Samphan, to name but two, sought to recast Cambodia anew…. The Khmer Rouge’s goal was simple: the rustication of an economy.

According to Charles Twining, the author of a chapter on the economy in “ Cambodia 1975-1978 ,” two months before the fall of Phnom Penh in 1975, a Khmer Rouge party congress, “reportedly presided over by Khieu Samphan, is generally thought to have made the decision to evacuate cities and abolish all currency after the takeover. The fact that the cities were all emptied within several days of the fall, with the people knowingly directed to spots in the countryside where they camped at least temporarily, does not give the impression of a sudden, knee jerk action. This had all been organized before hand.”

Here is the part of the dissertation published in the September 1976 issue of The Indochina Chronicle in its entirety:

The economy of Cambodia and its problems with industrialization

By khieu samphân..

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Microfiche. New Delhi : Library of Congress Office ; Washington, D.C. : Library of Congress Photoduplication Service, 1993. 2 microfiches. Master microform held by: DLC. Thesis (Ph. D.)--Universite de Paris, 1959.

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The Economy under the Khmer Rouge, 1975-79

The Sorbonne, Khieu Samphan, and the 'Pol Pot International'

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• Recent Developments at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia August, 2019 Recent Developments at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia BRIEFING PAPER Recent Developments at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia August, 2019 Recent Developments at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia Case 002/2: Death of Nuon Chea Nuon Chea, popularly known as “Brother No. 2” to indicate his position as second only to Pol Pot in command of the Khmer Rouge, died at the age of 93 on August 4, 2019 at the Khmer-Soviet Friendship Hospital. He had been convicted as a senior leader of the Khmer Rouge of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide. The Supreme Court Chamber affirmed a 2014 Trial Chamber Judgment in 2016. A second Trial Chamber Judgment, issued with full reasoning in March 2019, was on appeal to the Supreme Court when Nuon Chea died. He was sentenced to life in prison under both judgments. Only the second judgment included charges of genocide. The second trial against Nuon Chea, with Khieu Samphan as his co-accused, was the most far-reaching of the court, covering crimes committed at a number of cooperatives, worksites, security centers, and execution sites across the country. The trial lasted 24 months and included the testimony of 185 people and over 5,000 evidentiary documents. Unlike the first trial, the second included genocide charges. Nuon Chea and Khieu Sampan were judged guilty of genocide with respect to Vietnamese populations and Nuon Chea was additionally found guilty of genocide with respect to Cham Muslims. The Trial Chamber Judgment, the most extensive in the court’s history, covered over 2,300 pages in English. Two days after [Show full text]
• General Assembly Distr.: General 18 September 2020 United Nations A/75/242 General Assembly Distr.: General 18 September 2020 Original: English Seventy-fifth session Agenda item 141 Proposed programme budget for 2021 Request for a subvention to the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia Report of the Secretary-General Summary In his previous request for a subvention to the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (A/74/359), the Secretary-General identified progress made in the judicial work across all sets of proceedings before the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia. The Secretary-General also highlighted the continuing financial challenges facing both the international and national components of the Extraordinary Chambers and requested the approval of a subvention of up to $8.5 million for the year 2020. By its resolution 74/263 A, the General Assembly authorized the Secretary- General, as an exceptional measure, to enter into commitments in an amount not exceeding $7 million to supplement the voluntary financial resources of the international component of the Extraordinary Chambers for the period from 1 January to 31 December 2020, and requested the Secretary-General to report on the use of the commitment authority in the context of his next report. In the present report, the Secretary-General outlines the judicial progress of the Extraordinary Chambers since the issuance of the previous report, provides a projection regarding the anticipated use of the commitment authority for 2020, presents information on the proposed budget of the Chambers for 2021 and seeks the approval by the Assembly of an appropriation for a subvention for the international component of the Chambers in the amount of $8.5 million for 2021. [Show full text]
• ECCC, Case 002/01, Issue 72 KRT TRIAL MONITOR Case 002 ■ Issue No. 72 ■ Hearing on Closing Statements Week 3 ■ 28-31 October 2013 Case of Nuon Chea and Khieu Samphan * Asian International Justice Initiative (AIJI), a project of East-West Center and UC Berkeley War Crimes Studies Center They had the temerity to say that the policy program was not unusual or unreasonable, and certainly not unlawful. It was unlawful.1 - Keith Raynor, prosecutor I. OVERVIEW Over the course of three days this week, the Trial Chamber concluded the final hearings of Case 002/01. After 64 weeks of evidentiary hearings and 2 weeks of closing statements, this week brought the case to a close, with the conclusion of closing statements from the Khieu Samphan defense, responses to both defense teams’ rebuttals from the Civil Parties and the Co-Prosecutors, and rare final statements from the Co-Accused themselves. The Khieu Samphan defense started the week with their continued depiction of their client as a popular but powerless figure in the DK regime. Lawyers for the Civil Parties followed the next day with an aggressive reaction to the defense teams’ dismissal of victims’ painful experiences. Prosecutors then sought to establish the legal basis for convictions of the co- Accused for their alleged involvement in a joint criminal enterprise, which directed two forced population movements, as well as the execution of former Khmer Republic officials at Tuol Po Chrey. The Co-Accused and their lawyers spent the final day of hearings responding to these assertions one last time before the Trial Chamber adjourned to determine a verdict. [Show full text]
• ANNEX 4: KHIEU SAMPHAN CHRONOLOGY [With Evidentiary Sources] 00948464 E295/6/1.4 ANNEX 4: KHIEU SAMPHAN CHRONOLOGY [With Evidentiary Sources] Date Fact Source 27 July 1931 Khieu Samphan was born at Commune of Rom (1) E3/557, Khieu Samphan OCIJ Statement, 19 November 2007, at ENG 00153266, KHM 00153228, FRE 00153296; Chek, District of Rom Duol, Srok Rumduol, Svay (2) E1!21.1, Transcript, 13 December 2012, Khieu Samphan, 13.58.25; Rieng Province to his parents Khieu Long and Ly (3) E3/110, Sasha Sher, The Biography 0/ Khieu Samphan, at ENG 00280537, KHM Kong. 00702682, FRE 00087511; (4) E3/27, Khieu Samphan OCIJ Statement, 13 December 2007, at ENG 00156741. 1944 -1947 Khieu Samphan attended Preah Sihanouk College (1) E3/9, Philip Short, Pol Pot: The History 0/ a Nightmare, at ENG 00396223-26, FRE 00639487-91; in Kampong Cham one year behind Saloth Sar. (2) E3/713, Khieu Samphan Interview, January 2004, at ENG 00177979, KHM Khieu Samphan and Saloth Sar alias Pol Pot 00792436-37, FRE 00812131; organized for a theatre troupe to tour the provinces to (3) El!189.1, Transcript, 6 May 2013, Philip Short 09.24.24 to 09.26.54; (4) E1!21.1, Transcript, 13 December 2012, Khieu Samphan,14.03.34 to 14.05.20; raise money for them to visit the temples of Angkor (5) E3/2357R, Video Entitled "Pol Pot: The Journey to the Killing Fields," 2005, 06:04 to Wat. 06: II. 1946 Khieu Samphan, since 1946, had been actively E3/111, Ieng Sary Interview, 31 January 1972, at ENG 00762419, KHM 00711435-36, FRE 00738627. [Show full text]
• Part II Current Condition and Prospects Part II Current Condition and Prospects Chapter 1 Overview of Present State of Cambodia Part II Chapter 1 Section 1. Politics Section 1. Politics Yukio IMAGAWA 1. Good governance about 20 years. Although the peace process had many problems, it constituted the basis for the present politi- This paper deals with the state and problems of cal situation. In the following sections, the peace pro- Cambodia’s politics as a prelude to the discussion of cess, and then developments in Cambodia’s internal af- “good governance,” a key issue in development assis- fairs and its external relations in recent years after peace tance to that war-ravaged country. However, it is first was established are reviewed. necessary to look briefly at what “good governance” is from the viewpoint of politics. 2. The Cambodian peace process Although “good governance” is not necessarily syn- onymous with “good government,” it can be simply de- Cambodia once enjoyed peace under the policy of fined as “good governing by good government.” “Good neutrality promulgated by Prince Norodom Sihanouk, government” is often said to be tantamount to “cheap who was adored by the people as the father of indepen- government” or “small government” in terms of reduc- dence. But after March 1970, when Lieutenant General ing the financial burden on the public. But this is only Lon Nol overthrew Prince Sihanouk in a coup d’état, one aspect of good government. What matters most is Cambodia was turned into a killing field during a civil that good governance is conducted by a democratic gov- war that lasted about 20 years. [Show full text]
• In Cambodia by Khieu Umeraevelopmen~ in Cambodia by Khieu . -.-\ cflt+i Samphan Introduction Khieu Samphan's doctoraE thesis,* completed in Paris in Cambdia6s position in the world trade system. At the same 1959, was the first systematic application of Marxist economic time, the conditions he had analyzed in his thesis grew steadily theory to the specific problems of Cambodia. A5 such, it worse, making the need for change more acute. became a basic text for a whole generation of Cambodian Out of the cabinet, Khieu Samphan made a point of students in Paris during the 1960s. It was also widely studied familiarizing himself with peasant problems in order to defend and discussed among the left in Phnorn Penh. Foreshadowing their Interests. In 1966 he won one of the largest many of the policies that have been implemented in parliamentary majorities in the country. although Sihanouk Democratic Kampuchea, the thesis is important for its publicly opposed his reelection. But that election brought a influence on the leaders of the new government and for the conservative majority, which chose Lt. Gen. Lon Nol as light it casts on why they have adopted their present policies.* premier. Fn a draconian effort to improve the faltering economy, Lon Nol's government used the army to force peasant5 to sell rice to the government at a price lower than Khieu Samphan the cost of production, sparking a rebellion in Battambang province early in 1967'. When the army struck back, peasants burned government buildings and fled into the bush with their Born July 27, 1937, Khieu Samphan grew up in Kompong families. [Show full text]
• Prosecuting the Khmer Rouge Views from the Inside Prosecuting the Khmer Rouge Views from the Inside Content 1 Introduction Ratana Ly 2 Historical Background 3 The ECCC 4 The Different Actor Groups and their Relations to the ECCC 5 Patterns, Dynamics, Drivers of Acceptance and Rejection of the ECCC 6 Conclusion Prosecuting the Khmer Rouge: Views from the Inside Prosecuting the Khmer Rouge: Views from the Inside Ratana Ly1 ‘Justice, peace and democracy are not mutually exclusive objectives, but rather mutually reinforcing imperatives’ (United Nations Secretary General 2004). 1. Introduction Out of Cambodia’s total population of approximately 7 to 8 million, it is estimated that 1.5 to 2 million died of starvation, disease, and execution during the reign of the Democratic Kampuchea (DK) regime, which lasted from 17 April 1975 to 6 January 1979 (Kiernan 1996, 456-460). Following the fall of the DK (also known as the Khmer Rouge Regime), ‘a truth commission, lustration policies, amnesty programmes, and domestic or international trials were all considered or attempted’ to provide justice and peace for Cambodians (Ciorciari and Heindel 2014, 14). Out of these responses, the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC), a hybrid court established jointly by Cambodia and the United Nations (UN) is the only internationally recognised judicial mechanism established to address Khmer Rouge crimes.2 The ECCC is, however, the product of a political compromise, resulting from protracted negotiations between the Cambodian government and the UN, whose relationship was characterised by ‘bitter [Show full text]
• Searching for the Truth Issues 17 Searching for the truth. Magazine of Documentation Center of Cambodia Number 17, May 2001 Table of Contents Letter: Memory Exploitation ..................................1 DOCUMENTATION Vann Piny ................................................................2 Genocide Sites in Kampong Cham ..........................7 Speech of Son Sen ..................................................9 Daily Notes of a Khmer Rouge Cadre ...................13 The Shady Role of the Chinese Embassy .............15 HISTORY Voices from S-21 ...................................................20 Victims and Perpetrators ......................................23 Thai Nationals Executed at S-21 ..........................26 Quantifying Crimes Against Humanity .................28 LEGAL Evidence in the Prospective Trials .......................30 Related Crimes, Defenses.......................................33 Crimes Covered by the Draft Law .........................34 Nhem En, a photographer at S-21 PUBLIC DEBATE Copyright © The Khmer Rouge and the Vietnamese .................36 Documentation Center of Cambodia The End of the Revolution ....................................39 50 All rights reserved. Romanticizing the Khmer Rouge Revolution ......41 Licensed by the Ministry of Information of 50 Draft Law on the Establishment of Extra-Ordinary the Royal Government of Cambodia, 50 Chambers ...............................................................44 Prakas No.0291 P.M99 50 August 2, 1999. 100 FAMILY TRACING Photographs by the Documentation Center of 100 An Old [Show full text]
• ECCC, Case 002/01, Issue 30 KRT TRIAL MONITOR Case 002 ! Issue No. 30 ! Hearing on Evidence Week 25 ! 30-31 July, 1-2 August 2012 Case of Nuon Chea, Khieu Samphan and Ieng Sary Asian International Justice Initiative (AIJI), a project of East-West Center and UC Berkeley War Crimes Studies Center I think my job as an advocate here is not to provide some veneer, some facade, but to actually ask probing questions. And in this instance, I'm confronting the man! That's what lawyers do. That's what I think is done at all international tribunals. And that's exactly what I intend to do. - Mr. Michael Karnavas, Ieng Sary’s international counsel * I. OVERVIEW Rochoem Ton alias “Cheam,”1 a former high-ranking cadre from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA), continued his testimony this week. He provided details on his decision to join the revolution, the evacuation of Phnom Penh, the interaction between Office 870 and the MFA, the administration of the MFA, and Ieng Sary’s powers and duties. The Defense Teams attempted to challenge Rochoem Ton’s credibility by confronting him with statements he made in previous interviews, as well as other witnesses’ statements, that were inconsistent with his testimony. After the conclusion of Rochoem Ton’s examination on Thursday, the Trial Chamber called another former MFA cadre, Mr. Suong Sikoeun, to the witness stand. Suong Sikoeun’s testimony covered several matters, including his early years as a revolutionary, some CPK policies, FUNK and GRUNK, and the roles Ieng Sary and Khieu Samphan played in these organizations. II. [Show full text]
• Justice for Genocide in Cambodia - the Case for the Prosecution Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal Volume 12 Issue 3 Justice and the Prevention of Genocide Article 7 12-2018 Justice for Genocide in Cambodia - The Case for the Prosecution William Smith Extraordinary Chambers of the Courts of Cambodia Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarcommons.usf.edu/gsp Recommended Citation Smith, William (2018) "Justice for Genocide in Cambodia - The Case for the Prosecution," Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal: Vol. 12: Iss. 3: 20-39. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5038/1911-9933.12.3.1658 Available at: https://scholarcommons.usf.edu/gsp/vol12/iss3/7 This Conference Proceeding is brought to you for free and open access by the Open Access Journals at Scholar Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal by an authorized editor of Scholar Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected] . Justice for Genocide in Cambodia - The Case for the Prosecution Acknowledgements This address was prepared with the assistance of Caroline Delava, Martin Hardy and Andreana Paz, legal interns in the Office of the Co-Prosecutor. The opinions in this address are those of the author solely and reflect the concepts and essence of the address delivered at the Conference. This conference proceeding is available in Genocide Studies and Prevention: An International Journal: https://scholarcommons.usf.edu/gsp/vol12/iss3/7 Justice for Genocide in Cambodia - The Case for the Prosecution William Smith Extraordinary Chambers of the Courts of Cambodia Phnom Penh, Cambodia The Importance of Contemporaneous Documents and Academic Activism* Figure 1. [Show full text]
• 07-31-12 CTM Blog Entry Trial Judge Jean-Marc Lavergne questions witness Rochoem Ton at the ECCC on Tuesday. Witness Rochoem Ton Faces Questions from the Bench and Defense Teams on Third Day of Testimony By Erica Embree, JD/LLM (International Human Rights) candidate, Class of 2015, Northwestern University School of Law Trial Chamber Judge Jean-Marc Lavergne and the defense teams for Nuon Chea and Ieng Sary took their turn examining witness Rochoem Ton on Tuesday, July 31, 2012, in Case 002 against accused Nuon Chea, Khieu Samphan, and Ieng Sary at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC). The morning proceedings were attended by 220 villagers from Kampot who left their village at 5 a.m. this morning in order to attend the proceedings. One hundred villagers from Kampong Som observed the afternoon proceedings. All parties were present in the courtroom, except Ieng Sary who continued to observe the proceedings via audio-visual equipment in his holding cell due to his health issues. Prior to giving the floor to the defense team for Nuon Chea, Trial Chamber President Nil Nonn asked the members of the bench if anyone had questions to put to Rochoem Ton. Judge Lavergne indicated he wished to examine the witness and took the floor with several questions. Judge Lavergne Questions the Witness on Khieu Samphan Judge Lavergne first asked the witness about when he first met Khieu Samphan. The witness confirmed that he met Khieu Samphan in 1971, explaining that they met when Khieu Samphan went into the military kitchen hall, and they exchanged greetings. Judge Lavergne inquired whether the witness knew about or had discussions with any of the leadership about Khieu Samphan’s role, specifically his involvement in the Royal Government of the National Union of Kampuchea (GRUNK). [Show full text]
• 16 November 2018 Press Release NUON Chea and KHIEU Samphan Sentenced to Life Imprisonment in Case 002/02 Today, the Trial Chambe 16 November 2018 Press Release NUON Chea and KHIEU Samphan Sentenced to Life Imprisonment in Case 002/02 Today, the Trial Chamber of the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) convicted former senior Khmer Rouge leaders NUON Chea and KHIEU Samphan of genocide, crimes against humanity and grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions of 1949. The crimes were committed at various locations throughout Cambodia during the Democratic Kampuchea period from 17 April 1975 to 6 January 1979. The Trial Chamber announced a summary of its findings and the disposition in Case 002/02 at a public hearing held today, Friday 16 November 2018, sentencing the Accused, NUON Chea and KHIEU Samphan to life imprisonment. The Chamber will deliver full written reasons for its judgement in due course. Evidentiary hearings in the trial of Case 002/02 commenced with opening statements on 17 October 2014 and concluded on 11 January 2017. The trial, including closing statements, lasted for a total of 283 hearing days. During the trial, the Chamber heard the testimony of 185 individuals: 114 witnesses, 63 Civil Parties and 8 experts. The trial was subject to considerable public interest, with 82,780 persons attending the hearings. The Chamber’s Main Findings The Trial Chamber found that NUON Chea, Deputy Secretary of the Communist Party of Kampuchea (CPK) and KHIEU Samphan, the Head of State of Democratic Kampuchea, participated in a joint criminal enterprise together with other senior leaders of the CPK, with the purpose of implementing a rapid socialist [Show full text]

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A Cambodian Leader

By Iver Peterson

• April 18, 1975

It was characteristic of the early confusion surrounding the insurgency against President Lon Nol's new Cambodian Government in 1970 that there were strong doubts whether one of the reported leaders of the movement, Khieu Samphan, was even alive.

Man in the News

Radio Peking had accused Prince Norodom Sihanouk of having had the slender French‐educated economist murdered—by burning him with acid, according to one account—in 1967. Yet four years later, with Prince Sihanouk himself in exile in China after a coup by Marshal Lon Nol, Mr. Khieu Samphan reappeared as one of the insurgency's leaders.

Most recently, the 43‐year‐old Mr. Khieu Samphan—the name is pronounced cue samPAN —has emerged as the most prominent and probably the most powerful member of the little‐known group that directed the insurgents against Phnom Penh. He holds the titles of commander in chief of the Cambodian People's National Liberation Armed Forces and of both deputy premier and minister of national defense in the government headed — in name only, it appears—by Prince Norodom Sihanouk.

The titles may seem to be at odds with what is known of Mr. Khieu Samphan's character and background.

Father a Civil Servant

He was born on July 27, 1931, in Svay Rieng, a ricegrowing community close to the South Vietnamese border on the highway between Phnom Penh and Saigon. His father—like those of many other Asian nationalists and revolutionaries—was a civil servant in the French colonial administration, a position that permitted the son to receive a French education leading to professional training.

As a young man, Mr. Khieu Samphan was known for his studiousness and his quietness. “He was serious,” his younger brother, Khieu Seng Kim, recalled. “He studied a lot and did not run around.”

While still in high school in the period after World War II, when the Vietnamese guerrillas were fighting war that was eventually to end French rule in Indochina, Mr. Khieu Samphan was active in anti‐French and anticolonialist movements in Cambodia.

In 1954 he went to the University of Paris to study law and economics. He served as secretary general of the General Union of Khmer Students in France while working on a doctoral dissertation on the crippling effects of the French colonial economy on his country's development. Upon earning his doctorate in 1959 he returned to Phnom Penh.

Left‐Wing Doctrines

Mr. Khieu Samphan then founded a French‐language publication, l'Ohservateur, and, as its political director, espoused strongly left‐wing positions. His associations with Communism earned him the mistrust of Prince Sihanouk's one‐party government, so he was under constant surveillance, suffering occasional arrest and harassment.

In 1960 he was accosted on the street by a group of Sihanouk supporters and stripped to his undershorts, a humiliation that lie is said to recall with particular bitterness.

Despite the governmental suspicions he was allowed to run for and win a seat in the National Assembly as a member of Prince Norodom Sihanouk's party, the People's Socialist Cornmunity.

After briefly joining the Government as Secretary of State for Commerce, Mr. Khieu Samphan was purged in a reaction against rising prices. Back in the Assembly, he turned increasingly to the political left.

Final Break in 1967

The final break came on April 24, 1967, when the mercurial Prince publicly denounced him at a Buddhist rally for alleged complicity in a brief peasant revolt in Battambang Province. What followed that day is unclear. It was said that Marshal Lon Nol, then head of the army, had Mr. Khieu Samphan arrested and killed or that the Prince arranged to murder him and two others who are now leaders of the Communist forces, Hu Nim and Hou Yuon.

As events were to show, Mr. Khieu Samphan escaped. perhaps by hiding in the Chinese Embassy and reaching the then small Khmer Rouge —Red Khmer—underground.

He had never married and left no family behind. Associates were to say that he considered his political convictions incompatible with marriage and home life.

Once with the rebels Mr. Khieu Samphan evidently put his economic and organizational skills to work to forge both a growing army and the rudiments of an economic base to feed it in the expanding territories under rebel control.

Reports from the Communist zones indicate that he has reorganized agriculture in efforts to produce more rice from land so rich that farmers had exerted only minimal efforts to satisfy family needs.

A UN-backed tribunal on Khmer Rouge crimes just confirmed the conviction of key leader Khieu Samphan. What now?

Lecturer in Law, University of Sydney

Senior Lecturer in Law, University of Sydney

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Rosemary Grey receives funding from the Australian Research Council and University of Sydney, and has previously received funding from the Sydney Southeast Asia Centre.

Rachel Killean does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

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A United Nations-backed tribunal in Cambodia has just concluded its largest trial, concerning crimes committed during the Khmer Rouge regime. The tribunal’s appeal judges yesterday confirmed the conviction against 91-year-old Khieu Samphan , the former head of state, for his role in these crimes.

Yesterday’s decision was a turning point. After this, there will be no further trials in the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia. But what will the lasting impacts of these trials be?

Read more: Khmer Rouge genocide: Nuon Chea's death has major implications for justice in Cambodia

What was the Khmer Rouge regime?

The Khmer Rouge , otherwise known as Communist Party of Kampuchea, held power in Cambodia from 1975 to 1979. Their ascent to power followed a period of violent authoritarianism, conflict and the loss of half a million lives during US bombing in the Vietnam war.

While many Cambodians initially welcomed the Khmer Rouge’s victory, this popular support was short-lived. Life under Khmer Rouge rule meant forced labour, starvation, and the constant threat of torture, imprisonment and death.

Prosecuting the crimes of the Khmer Rouge

In 1979, the Vietnamese defeated the Khmer Rouge and installed a tribunal to prosecuted Communist Party of Kampuchea Prime Minister Pol Pot and Deputy Prime Minister Ieng Sary in absentia.

After that largely symbolic effort, there was no accountability for the crimes of the Khmer Rouge for several decades.

However, following negotiations between the Cambodian People’s Party (still in power) and the UN, in 2003 a tribunal was established to prosecute senior Khmer Rouge leaders and “those most responsible” for the crimes.

Known officially as the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia , this UN-backed tribunal started work in 2006. Its jurisdiction covers crimes defined in Cambodian law and international law, including war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide.

There is now a permanent court to prosecute these kinds of crimes: the International Criminal Court in The Hague. But it can only address crimes committed after 2002, whereas the UN-backed tribunal in Cambodia’s mandate reaches back to the 1970s.

In its 16 years of operation, the UN-backed tribunal in Cambodia has completed just three trials.

In the first trial , it found Kaing Guek Eav (alias “Duch”), former head of the S-21 prison, guilty of crimes against humanity and war crimes.

S-21 was used to torture suspected enemies of the regime. An estimated 12,000 men, women and children were detained there; only 12 are known to have survived. Duch’s conviction was upheld on appeal, and he died in prison in 2020.

The next case concerned four Communist Party of Kampuchea senior leaders: Nuon Chea, Khieu Samphan, Ieng Sary and Ieng Thirith.

But Ieng Thirith was found unfit to stand trial in 2012 and Ieng Sary died in 2013, leaving only two defendants in the case.

Due to the complexity of the case, the tribunal split it into two phases.

In 2014 , the tribunal convicted Nuon Chea and Khieu Samphan of crimes connected to the expulsion of Cambodia’s urban population into rural worksites. This conviction was mostly upheld in 2016 , with both defendants receiving a life sentence.

In 2018 , it convicted both men of further crimes against humanity, war crimes and genocide.

This conviction covered forced labour, the torture and execution of suspected dissidents, crimes targeting ethnic, political and religious groups, and orchestrating forced marriages with a view to incentivising population growth.

The judgement also recognised many rapes by Khmer Rouge cadre in worksites and prison sites, although these crimes were not formally charged.

Both men appealed the 2018 judgement, but Nuon Chea died shortly after at age 93, leaving Khieu Samphan as the sole appellant.

The case that ended yesterday was the Cambodia tribunal’s only case to include charges of genocide.

Nuon Chea was convicted of genocide against the ethnic Vietnamese and Cham groups; Khieu Samphan was convicted of genocide against the ethnic Vietnamese only.

These legal findings do not necessarily square with popular conceptions of genocide in Cambodia, where “genocide” has come to mean the atrocity crimes against the entire population.

But in international law , “genocide” is defined more narrowly – it only captures crimes committed with an intent to destroy a national, ethnic, racial or religious group.

Nor do the tribunal’s genocide findings necessarily accord with the perspectives of the targeted groups. Our research suggests the Cham and ethnic Vietnamese communities do not always draw clear distinctions between their experience, and that of the broader Cambodian population. While they wanted the tribunal to recognise their suffering, this did not have to include a conviction of genocide targeting them exclusively.

But ultimately, these legal details may not matter. It seems the 2018 genocide conviction was meaningful for many Cambodians, who viewed it as affirming their experience of “genocide”.

Many Khmer Rouge leaders died before they could be indicted, and attempts to prosecute other suspects were blocked by the Cambodian government.

Now, attention is turning to the tribunal’s legacy .

Already, there are signs it affected the historical record. For example, the pattern of forced marriage and sexual violence recorded in its judgements was not widely acknowledged by Cambodian or Western historians prior to these trials.

But the full extent of the tribunal’s impact will take decades to assess.

It is yet to be seen whether it effected the rule of law in Cambodia, whether its judgements and reparations brought a meaningful sense of justice to survivors, and how the judgements will influence understandings of the regime and its crimes.

Read more: Cambodians await crucial tribunal finding into 1970s brutal Khmer Rouge regime

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Hou Yuon, born in 1930, was a close colleague of Khieu Samphân , with whom he attended high school in Phnom Penh, but a man of very different temperament. Where Samphân always religiously toed the party line, Yuon spoke his mind and refused to kowtow to party orthodoxy. In , in the 1950s, where he completed a doctoral thesis in economic sciences ( La paysannerie du Cambodge et ses projets de modernisation, 1955 ), he was immensely popular among his fellow students, a jovial, larger-than-life figure, who was their immediate and unanimous choice to head the AEK, the Khmer Students’ Association (Short, 2007: 85). Like Samphân, his ideas on the Cambodian economy, and in particular the importance of the peasantry, would later influence Khmer Rouge policy (Sher, 2004: 207). In , too, he befriended Pol Pot , who became a member of Yuon’s cell of the Cercle Marxiste , a relationship which would stand him in good stead when in later years he ran into political difficulties.

In 1958, he was nominated to parliament by Prince Sihanouk and became a junior minister as part of the same political balancing act that would later bring Khieu Samphân to government office. Nine years later, when Sihanouk clamped down on the left wing, Yuon joined Samphân again to flee into the jungle. After the 1970’s coup, he held successively the ministry of the Interior and the ministry of communal reforms and cooperatives within the GRUNK. But where Samphân was content to follow unquestioningly party directives, Yuon was not, and, by 1974, his outspokenness had put him under a cloud (Heder). Nominally responsible for collectivization in Sihanouk’s resistance government, he would have been one of those who expressed criticism on the PCK congress in 1971. Hou Yuon thought the cooperative system was being imposed too fast, was against the collectivization of personal objects and food and the suppression of family gardens. He also took stand against the market’s abolition (Sher, 2004: 212). He is alleged to have warned Pol Pot and Nuon Chea (in what may be an apocryphal remark, though still widely quoted by former Khmer Rouge officials): “If you go on like this, I give your regime three years. Then it will collapse” (Short, 2007: chapter 2; Sher).

He was not immediately purged, but was sent to plant vegetables at a small Khmer Rouge base on the Chinit River called K-6. After this penance, he returned briefly to favor, making a broadcast in January 1975 on the Khmer Rouge radio in which he warned the people of Phnom Penh that if they did not change sides they would “die uselessly”. But the following month he was in trouble again, and with two other Khmer Rouge veterans who were regarded as excessively liberal, was made to kick his heels in a series of makeshift camps until Phnom Penh had been secured (Short, 2007). Hou Yuon was however present during the meeting of May 1975 when Pol Pot submitted to the Khmer Rouge leaders his plan in eight points. According to several testimonies, he would have opposed strongly to the cities evacuation and this position probably cost him his definitive eviction (Kiernan, 1996: 33, 59).

The date of his death remains mysterious and there exist dozens of different versions. Most western accounts claim that he was executed right after the Khmers Rouges seized the capital. There is now overwhelming evidence that that version is untrue and according to many Khmer witnesses, his death didn’t occur immediately (Kiernan, 1996: 59-61; 1985: 417). According to a witness recently interviewed by Philip Short, Yuon was seen alive at a Khmer Rouge base at Stung Trang as late as the autumn of 1976. However, the precise circumstances of his death are still debated and hypothetic. Steve Heder considers Hou Yuon could have died of disease after having been “judged”. Others express the suggestion he may have committed suicide. Another account, from Khmer Rouge sources, tells his death occurred when Pol Pot sent a montagnard bodyguard to bring him back to Phnom Penh. When he arrived, the man thought Yuon made a movement as though to draw his pistol and shot him dead. It was treated as an accident (Short, 2007).

A characteristic way the Khmers Rouges talk about their past and historical movement is to change versions over time to adapt stories to different circumstances. In this way, Hou Yuon was restored to favor in Khmer Rouge discourses after 1978 (Sher, 2004: 290) and whenever Pol Pot referred to him he used the term “comrade”, indicating that his loyalty was not questioned anymore.

KANE, Solomon, 2007, Dictionnaire des Khmers rouges , IRASEC, Aux Lieux d’être.

KIERNAN, Ben, 1985, How Pol Pot Came to Power. A History of Communism in Kampuchea, 1930-1975 , London: New Left Books.

KIERNAN, Ben, 1996, The Pol Pot Regime. Race, Power and Genocide in Cambodia under the Khmer Rouge, 1975-79 , New Haven and London: Yale University Press.

SHER, Sacha, 2004, Le Kampuchéa des "Khmers rouges" : essai de compréhension d'une tentative de révolution , : L'Harmattan.

SHORT, Philip, 2007, Pol Pot. Anatomie d’un cauchemar , : Denoël.

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'Blueprint' for forced labour

Publication date 16 February 2012 | 05:10 ICT

Reporter : Bridget Di Certo

Former president of Democratic Kampuchea Khieu Samphan was obsessively determined to implement the radical economic policies of his doctoral thesis, civil party lawyers at the Khmer Rouge tribunal said yesterday.

Khieu Samphan’s 1959 thesis Cambodia’s Economy and Industrial Development provided a blueprint for the forced-labour projects of the Khmer Rouge regime that have been characterized as crimes against humanity and provided the political and economic reasoning to support enslaving the population, civil party lawyers attempted to demonstrate yesterday.

“[Khieu Samphan] was obsessively determined to put the contents of his thesis into practice,” civil party lawyer Olivier Bahougne told the court yesterday.

The prosecution and civil parties this week have been highlighting documents they view as relevant to the historical context of the Khmer Rouge prior to the April 17, 1975, takeover of Phnom Penh and subsequent evacuation of the city’s population, which is the key subject matter of the first mini-trial in Case 002 against the three surviving senior leaders of Democratic Kampuchea.

Like the other leaders, Khieu Samphan studied in Paris in the 1950s, where he is alleged to have fallen in with radical leftist student groups.

The Khmer Rouge’s own economic principles greatly reflect the former nominal head of state’s thesis, civil party lawyers said yesterday, adding that this demonstrated the “high degree of political implication of Khieu Samphan” in the policies of the Khmer Rouge.

In audio-visual footage presented by civil party lawyers yesterday, Khieu Samphan also claimed it was he who was instrumental in bringing then-Prince Norodom Sihanouk in­to an alliance with the Khmer Rouge.

An intellectual, Khieu Samphan also served in the government under Sihanouk for a brief period before being ejected for his leftist ideals.

Khieu Samphan’s legal counsel raised a “grave” translation issue concerning a document raised by the co-prosecutors.

“The translation of this document has grave issues as to the reputation of the former king,” counsel Kong Sam Onn said, adding that a translated version of the document appeared to implicate now-King Father Norodom Sihanouk in ordering the executions of two prominent Khmer Rouge leaders, Hu Nim and Hou Yuon in 1977.

Contact PhnomPenh Post for full article

Cambodia tribunal rejects appeal by Khmer Rouge leader as it ends work

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia — An international court convened in Cambodia to judge the brutalities of the Khmer Rouge regime that caused the deaths of an estimated 1.7 million people in the 1970s. It ends its work Thursday after spending $337 million and 16 years to convict just three men of crimes.

In what was set to be its final session, the U.N.-assisted tribunal rejected an appeal by Khieu Samphan , the last surviving leader of the Khmer Rouge government that ruled Cambodia from 1975 to 1979. He was convicted in 2018 of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes and given life in prison, a sentence reaffirmed Thursday.

He appeared in court Thursday in a white windbreaker, sitting in a wheelchair, wearing a face mask and listening to the proceedings on a pair of headphones. Seven judges were in attendance.

Khieu Samphan was the group’s nominal head of state but, in his trial defense, denied having real decision-making powers when the Khmer Rouge carried out a reign of terror to establish a utopian agrarian society, causing Cambodians’ deaths from execution, starvation and inadequate medical care. It was ousted from power in 1979 by an invasion from neighboring communist state Vietnam.

“No matter what you decide, I will die in prison,” Khieu Samphan said in his final statement of appeal to the court last year. “I will die always remembering the suffering of my Cambodian people. I will die seeing that I am alone in front of you. I am judged symbolically rather than by my actual deeds as an individual.”

In his appeal, he alleged the court made errors in legal procedures and interpretation and acted unfairly, making objections to more than 1,800 points.

But the court noted Thursday that his appeal did not directly question the facts of the case as presented in court. It rejected almost all arguments raised by Khieu Samphan, acknowledging an error and reversing its ruling on one minor point. The court said it found the vast majority of Khieu Samphan’s arguments “unfounded,” and that many were “alternative interpretations of the evidence.”

The court announced that its judgment of several hundred pages would be official when it is published, and ordered that Khieu Samphan be returned to the specially constructed jail where he has been kept. He was arrested in 2007.

Thursday’s ruling makes little practical difference. Khieu Samphan is 91 and already serving another life sentence for his 2014 conviction for crimes against humanity connected with forced transfers and disappearances of masses of people.

His co-defendant Nuon Chea , the Khmer Rouge’s No. 2 leader and chief ideologist, was convicted twice and received the same life sentence. Nuon Chea died in 2019 at age 93.

The tribunal’s only other conviction was that of Kaing Guek Eav, also known as Duch , who was commandant of Tuol Sleng prison, where roughly 16,000 people were tortured before being taken away to be killed. Duch was convicted in 2010 of crimes against humanity, murder and torture and died in 2020 at age 77 while serving a life sentence.

The Khmer Rouge’s real chief, Pol Pot, escaped justice. He died in the jungle in 1998 at age 72 while the remnants of his movement were fighting their last battles in the guerrilla war they launched after losing power.

The trials of the only other two defendants were not completed. The former foreign minister of the Khmer Rouge, Ieng Sary, died in 2013, and his wife, former Social Affairs Minister Ieng Thirith, was deemed unfit to stand trial due to dementia in 2011 and died in 2015.

Four other suspects, middle-ranking Khmer Rouge leaders, escaped prosecution because of a split among the tribunal’s jurists.

Heather Ryan, who spent 15 years following the tribunal for the Open Society Justice Initiative, said the court was successful in providing some level of accountability.

“The amount of time and money and effort that’s expended to get to this rather limited goal may be disproportionate to the goal,” she said in a video interview from her home in Boulder, Colorado.

But she praised having the trials “in the country where the atrocities occurred and where people were able to pay a level of attention and gather information about what was happening in the court to a much greater extent than if the court had been in The Hague or some other place.” The Hague in the Netherlands hosts the World Court and the International Criminal Court.

The tribunal’s legacy goes beyond the individual convictions, said Craig Etcheson, who has studied and written about the Khmer Rouge and was chief of investigations for the office of the prosecution at the tribunal from 2006 to 2012.

“The court successfully attacked the long-standing impunity of the Khmer Rouge, and showed that though it might take a long time, the law can catch up with those who commit crimes against humanity,” he said.

The Associated Press

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THE KHMER ROUGE CANON 1975-1979

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Course content material written for Canadian High School students commissioned by the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada.

Matt Galway

Sok Udom Deth

Dr. Juan R. Céspedes, Ph.D.

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Stephanie Benzaquen-Gautier

If there is a period in Cambodia’s history that has been overlooked and disparaged, it is certainly the republican one (1970–1975). The Khmer Republic is often viewed as a corrupt, incompetent regime – an interregnum doomed to failure. This article revisits this narrative through currently available written sources. It argues that a cultural approach to the existing records helps us understand how such a negative view, still prevailing today, was discursively constructed. The analysis of the interpretations of a range of protagonists, observers and academics contributes to a critical historiography that might challenge assumptions and clichés about the Republic. This implies a re-working of the ‘republican archive’, a multiform and scattered body that presents a structural imbalance due to the discrepancy between the limited sources coming from the Republic itself and the significant amount of US records. The article reassembles these archival materials. It proposes a different reading of these documents in terms of discipline. It suggests that this might be the first step towards reassessing the Republic and the two dominant themes of that period: the overthrow of head of state, Prince Norodom Sihanouk, in 1970 (which marked the end of the monarchy) and the civil war. Part of the research for this paper was made possible through the COTCA Project, and therefore received funding from the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program (grant no. 682081).

Asia Research Institute working paper 200, May 2013

Trude Jacobsen , Martin Stuart-Fox

Rasmeykanyka Bin , Saren Keang

Christian Oesterheld

Despite macro-level advances in ASEAN regional cooperation, on the ground anti-Vietnamese xenophobia remains an unsavory reality in contemporary Cambodia. During the 2013 national elections the newly constituted Cambodian National Rescue Party (CNRP), a merger of the Sam Rainsy Party (SRP) and the Human Rights Party (HRP), has capitalized strongly on anti-Vietnamese sentiments, leading to some minor violent incidents and a prolonged discussion on a renewal of racialism in contemporary Cambodia. Against widely hold views that the strong anti-Vietnamese animus constitutes a century-old historical continuity, this paper argues that popular Khmer anti-Vietnamism is predominantly based on folklorist representations of the lower Mekong delta’s early and mid 19th century social history and that it has undergone two significant – and closely interrelated – transformations in the course of Cambodia’s political history throughout the 20th century. The first transformative framework concerns times of crisis in the constitutive periods of Cambodian independence in the 1940s as well as the reconstitution of Cambodian statehood and nationalism in the early 1970s and again in the early 1990s. Building on René Girard’s mimetic theory, this paper argues that the Vietnamese minority in Cambodia has been ‘scapegoated’ as a ‘dispensable other’ which could be sacrificed in order to re-establish social cohesion in times of intra-societal conflict. As a result, the colloquial Khmer term “yuon”, formerly used as a neutral ethnic denomination, has assumed an increasingly derogatory meaning. Intrinsically related to the issue of ‘scapegoating’ is a second transformative moment which concerns the politicization of anti-Vietnamese sentiments in late 20th century Cambodia. It is argued here that this latter transformation has been fostered by ultra-nationalist tenants of Khmer Rouge ideology in the wake of the Third Indochina War. Ever since, divergent political camps have been prone to the use of anti-Vietnamese racialism in order to mobilize support from the Cambodian electorate. By de-cyphering the historical repertoires of Khmer xenophobia against their Vietnamese neighbors, this paper suggests that contemporary Cambodian society continues to fail in its attempts to overcome the social legacy of decades of civil war and factionalist infighting.

massviolence.org

Helene Lavoix

While working our way through the literature dealing with the Cambodian drama, which took place during the regime known as Democratic Kampuchea (DK) (used somehow improperly to cover the period 1975-1979 and corresponding to the rule of the Communist Party of Kampuchea (CPK), when DK technically did not exist before March 1976), it became clear that our understanding of this period of Cambodian history was not only dependent upon the efforts of the students of Cambodia, but also constrained by the broad political and normative environment. It is thus along these lines that we shall present the reviewed scholarship. In its early stage, as we shall see first, the scholarship has been victim of the characteristics of the Communist rule in Cambodia. Then, the second wave of scholarship has been partly dependent upon considerations linked to international politics. However, these difficulties prove to be beneficial. Indeed, they generated, at the empirical level, a wealth of documentation and archives that are not usually available in the countries having known such transformations. This second wave of scholarship will continue, research being notably dependent upon access to new archival material. At the theoretical level, efforts by students of Cambodia to correct previously flawed or incomplete explanations led to controversies out of which came a greater and an increasingly sophisticated understanding of the Communist period, of its pre-conditions and of its grim achievements. This conducted to a new phase of research, partly overlapping the previous one, characterised by a focus on processes, and greatly benefiting from previously accumulated scholarship, which furthermore endeavoured to study a potential link between genocide and nation-ness, this term referring to a collective feeling or consciousness that characterises the specific identity, “the nation”. Indeed, in the Cambodian case, references are made throughout the whole body of knowledge to the nationalist character of DK, or more exactly to its “ultra-nationalist, xenophobic, chauvinistic or racist” stance, while, more generally, the significance of nationhood and of some of its potential components such as racism, has bearing for genocide, notably in the framework of the UN genocide definition.

The paper posits that China is a significant factor influencing Pol Pot’s foreign policy decisions and implementation. In the attainment of national interests for absolute independence and self-reliance at the emergence of external and internal security threats, Pol Pot, the most influential Khmer Rouge leader, could not survive without China’s strong support. Thus, he needs to form whatever policies that have to be consistent with what China wants otherwise his regime might end up losing the latter’s support. In this aspect, the more strictly he complies with those policies, the more likely his regime heavily depends on China. In sum up, this case precisely divulges the regime failure as a result of the stagnant policy enforcement and prodigious dependence on only one external actor, China, who is reluctant to offer more help when Pol Pot refuses to obey its advice.

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Khieu Samphan's (Khmer Rouge) 1959 doctoral thesis

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Khmer Rouge military leader Khieu Samphan's 1959 doctoral thesis identified the urban bourgeoisie as a parasite class that had to be removed to the countryside Click to expand...

Dark Knight

Troll-slayer.

essucht said: Ran across the following as a minor point made in an article: presuming this is an accurate summation of his thesis, this leads me to wonder how one can write such a thesis in 1950s France and not face summary expulsion?!? Click to expand...

Dark Knight said: Why would someone have faced (or face, for that matter) expulsion from a French university for writing a Marxist doctoral dissertation? Samphan took Marxist antipathy towards the city as the centre of bourgeois decadence further, combining it with Marxist classification of classes or areas as 'parasitic' to create a justification for immediate elimination of the city as opposed to Marx's vague vision of the distinction between urban and rural gradually disappearing during the final synthesis. Click to expand...

Emperor of Europe

Field marshal.

essucht said: Because one would think that calling for the elimination of a massive number of human "parasites" would set off warning bells considering that something similiar had just gone on a few years before in France? Perhaps I just haven't been cynical enough about what might pass for a successful thesis paper in a western university, but I would think that an open call for mass murder of a civilian population wouldn't pass muster... Click to expand...

Emperor of Europe said: If you read the quote you supplied once more, you'll see that there is no mention of mass murder. It's also one of the basic principles of western universities not to let politics decide what kind of research is acceptable and what isn't. I wouldn't dream of defending his thesis, but I will defend his right to make it. rgds/EoE Click to expand...

Keyser Pacha

essucht said: How would one empty the city to the country side and eliminate the urban middle class and elite without mass murder? It is true enough that in 1959 no one had the historical basis we have now about how it did work out...but surely even the briefest of considerations of the proposal, let alone the review of a thesis, would bring the certainity of such occuring to the fore? Click to expand...

There is of course still the central issue of exactly what his thesis actually said and whether the brief snippet is accurate. I don't suppose anyone has actually read it here? Click to expand...

• Jan 5, 2006

Keyser Pacha said: No i havent, few chances you will find someone here i think, however i may have access to it as i am a student, in wich university was it presented ? Click to expand...

unmerged(13991)

Dark Knight said: Samphan presented it at the Sorbonne. IIRC, he wasn't the only future Khmer Rouge leader to study there. Click to expand...

sting01 said: Did Verges studied at La Sorbonne? Click to expand...

http://www.germe.info/guide/inventaires/collectifvietnam.htm Beware it's Deep Purple oooooooooops that does not rock, it's deep red (UNEF + CGT), but archived. Here I think you can get it in english : Samphan, Cambodia's Economy and Industrial Development, (written in 1959, translated and published by Laura Summers in 1979). Certainly by : Indochina Chronicle. Berkeley, CA: Indochina Resource Center Can be consulted here : Department of Economics University of California, Berkeley Btw us , if you I would like to contact the UNEF, they certainly archived that work (and certainly more). Hope it help