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- Date: Fri, 22 Jan 1993 12:06:29 -0500
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- From: Nhan Tran <tran@PEORA.SDC.CCUR.COM>
- Subject: CAM: Khmer Rouge detains 12 UN personnels
- Lines: 54
-
- 01/21
-
- Cambodia
-
- Copyright, 1993. The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
-
- By SHEILA McNULTY
- Associated Press Writer
- PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (AP) -- Khmer Rouge guerrillas kept 12 U.N. personnel
- under detention for a fourth day today as architects of Cambodia's peacekeeping
- operation prepared to try edging the peace process forward.
- In Bangkok, Thailand, Indonesia's foreign minister failed to get the Khmer
- Rouge to rejoin the peace process.
- The Khmer Rouge says it will not cooperate with U.N. peacekeepers until all
- Vietnamese are evicted from Cambodia and it gets more power in the interim
- period before elections in May.
- The Communist group, which slaughtered hundreds of thousands of Cambodians
- during its radical regime in 1975-78, has until Wednesday to register as a
- political party to participate in the U.N.-organized elections.
- Australian Foreign Minister Gareth Evans and Indonesian Foreign Minister Ali
- Alatas were to arrive in Phnom Penh on Friday for several days of meetings with
- U.N. officials and Cambodian politicians. Marrack Goulding, the top U.N.
- official for peacekeeping, is scheduled to arrive Sunday.
- Evans and Alatas were instrumental in forging the peace accord that
- Cambodia's Vietnam-installed government and three rebel factions signed in
- October 1991 to end their 13-year civil war.
- The accord authorized a U.N. operation of 22,000 peacekeepers, who are to
- disarm the factions and prepare for elections. But the Khmer Rouge has refused
- to disarm and blocked election preparations in the 15 percent of the Cambodian
- countryside that it controls.
- The U.N. Security Council imposed an oil embargo on Khmer Rouge-held
- territory Jan. 1 trying to force compliance. It is not clear if the embargo has
- been effective.
- In another area, U.N. police have begun exercising their new authority to
- arrest Cambodians suspected of committing politically motivated violence, a
- move they hope will end grenade and shooting attacks on opposition politicians.
- Spokesman Eric Falt said U.N. civilian police on Saturday arrested M. Chan,
- the main suspect in the murder of Kiev Savuth on Jan. 14 and flew him to Phnom
- Penh to determine if he should stand trial.
- Alatas met with Khmer Rouge President Khieu Samphan but was unable to make
- headway. But Evans said that even if the Khmer Rouge did not take part in
- elections, that did not mean the process would be disrupted.
- In the past two months, the Khmer Rouge have detained U.N. personnel more
- than six times in various parts of the country before releasing them unharmed.
- The 12 held since Monday at the guerrilla headquarters in Pailin, 220 miles
- northwest of Phnom Penh, are from the United States, Ireland, Ghana, Britain,
- Australia and Cambodia.
- Pailin is the only important area under Khmer Rouge control where U.N.
- personnel have been allowed.
- The workers have been told they cannot leave the town except to return to
- Phnom Penh, Falt said. He declined to say whether U.N. officials were planning
- to withdraw the men.
- "It is not a normal situation, but we're not worried about the safety and
- well-being of our personnel," Falt said. He declined further comment.
-