Pen Sovan, Hun Sen Argue Who Between Them Was Boss When Vietnam Invaded Cambodia
SEP20081224045002 Phnom Penh Moneaksekar Khmer in Cambodian 24 Dec 08 pp 1, 4
[Article by Sok Hean]
Former Prime Minister Pen Sovan responded to Prime Minister Hun Sen's attack on
Monday 22 December when Hun Sen told the students during a graduation ceremony
at the National Education Institute that he was higher in rank than a person
who was his comrade in arms during the revolution, whom Hun Sen did not mention
by name but who was known to most as being Pen Sovan, when the Cambodian forces
supported by Vietnamese troops overthrew the Khmer Rouge regime on 7 January
1979.
Ex-Comrade Pen Sovan, currently vice president of the Human Rights Party in
charge of Disciplinary Commission, talked at length about his role in the
creation of the Kampuchean National United Front for National Salvation
[KNUFNS] on 2 December 1978, now known as the Kampuchean National United Front
for National Development, headed by Heng Samrin, currently chairman of the
National Assembly.
Pen Sovan asserted, "I am certainly the Father of the 2 December anniversary."
He went on to say, "Hun Sen is certainly one of my underlings at the start of
the Khmer People's Republic regime, created following the fall of the Khmer
Rouge regime."
In a cutting remark intended for Hun Sen Pen Sovan said, "History has already
been written. Hun Sen should be ashamed because at that time he was merely a
member of the Front movement in charge of youth affairs." Pen Sovan further
said that it is because January is drawing near that Hun Sen wants to cover up
the truth.
"I do not want to respond to a man who does not know his own Cambodian history,
a man who is distorting history in this manner. If Hun Sen really has guts, I
ask the national television to give me one hour to replay the 2 December and 7
January documents that I have preserved to these days. And I ask the Cambodian
people to look at these documents on the screen and draw their own conclusion
as to who was bigger than whom and who said what in these documents on 2
December 1978 and 7 January 1979. When they have seen the documents on TV all
Cambodian people will know who was bigger than whom."
Last Monday Hun Sen said that he was shown a tape recording of Pen Sovan's
remarks broadcasted over Radio Beehive in which Pen Sovan was heard claiming
that his status was bigger than Hun Sen's in the movement that overthrew the
Khmer Rouge regime. Pen Sovan was prime minister in the 1980s and vice
chairman of the KNUFNS founded on 2 December 1978, or 30 years ago, to topple
the Democratic Kampuchea regime of the Khmer Rouge.
Prime Minister Hun Sen said, "In 1979 I was the big leader in the region east
of the Mekong. However, a man claimed he was the Father of 2 December and 7
January and he even claimed that I was one of his minions."
The man mentioned by Hun Sen was Pen Sovan and Pen Sovan at that time was in
reality a second lieutenant in the Vietnamese army under Heng Samrin, who then
was chairman of the Front and now chairman of the National Assembly.
Hun Sen said, "I want to send a message to him that he should behave properly.
Please do not make too many lies. I do not want to show his name. You are
lying to other people."
Hun Sen went on to say that what Pen Sovan was correct in his speech was that
"I was the one who arrested him right in his house. This is the only thing in
his speech that was right."
Hun Sen also affirmed that it is now too late for Pen Sovan to return to the
Cambodian People's Party.
Appointed prime minister in May 1981 but arrested in December the same year on
charges of treason against the communist regime and opposition to the presence
of Vietnamese troops in Cambodia at that time, Pen Sovan was detained for 10
years in Hanoi without any trial. He was released from prison in Vietnam in
1991 following the signing of the Paris Peace Agreements by the Cambodian side
on 23 October 1991.
Nonetheless, monitors of the political situation have predicted that Hun Sen
would not allow the state television TVK to give Pen Sovan an hour of air time
to show the documents concerning the 2 December and 7 January events. This is
because if Hun Sen allows Pen Sovan to broadcast the documents that he claimed
he had in his possession the Cambodian public could clearly know that between
Hun Sen and Pen Sovan who the real boss was when the Vietnamese troops invaded
Cambodia in early 1979.
[Description of Source: Phnom Penh Moneaksekar Khmer in Cambodian Translated as
Khmer Conscience. Widely read anti-government daily newspaper affiliated with
the Sam Rainsy Party; occasionally adopts pro-US stance.]
"My Khmer Compatriots, ask not what Cambodia and her People can do for you, ask
what you can do for Cambodia and her People"
The Khmer Politicians have only interpreted the Cambodia and her beloved people
in various ways.
The point, however, is to change it...
---Khmer Blood---
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