Breakaway Khmer Rouge negotiates cease-fire

Breakaway Khmer Rouge negotiates cease-fire

PHNOM MALAI, Cambodia (Reuter): Breakaway Khmer Rouge leader
Ieng Sary said yesterday he had negotiated a cease-fire with the
Cambodian government, but more time and talks were needed for
comprehensive settlement.

Ieng Sary, foreign minister during the Khmer Rouge's 1975-1979
"killing fields" rule, split from hardline leader Pol Pot last
month with several thousand followers and has since sought peace
with the government.

Political analysts said the split, possibly the gravest yet
within the Maoist Khmer Rouge, could prove a major step in the
quest for national reconciliation in a nation struggling to
recover from decades of war. The split emerged when hardliners
accused Ieng Sary of embezzlement and ordered his execution.

"I would like to inform you that my talks for national
reconciliation with the representatives from Phnom Penh were
successful," Ieng Sary told more than 100 journalists at a news
conference at his headquarters in this northwestern town.

"We reached agreement on a cease-fire and to begin contact
between our troops. They also agreed to provide legal protection
for me," he added.

Ieng Sary, dressed in a green safari suit and looking more
like a businessman than a guerrilla leader, said the question of
merging his troops with government forces was the most important
issue still being negotiated.

He held high-level peace talks with Cambodian co-defense
ministers Tea Banh and Tea Chamrath in Bangkok last week.

Ieng Sary and Pol Pot, his former brother-in-law, were
sentenced to death in absentia for their role in the deaths of
more than one million people from execution, starvation or
disease during Khmer Rouge rule.

The Khmer Rouge signed a peace accord in 1991 but later
reneged on the accord and have been fighting the coalition
government that emerged from UN-run elections in 1993.

Ieng Sary, now in his 60s, said that after he recently met
high-level representatives from Phnom Penh, he had received a
letter from Cambodia co-Prime Ministers Prince Norodom Ranariddh
and Hun Sen praising him for helping make the talks successful.

He formed a movement called the Democratic National United
Movement last month to work for reconciliation with Cambodia.

Cambodian co-premier Hun Sen said over the weekend that Ieng
Sary's breakaway faction now recognized the authority of the
Cambodian government as well as a 1994 law that banned the Khmer
Rouge.

Ieng Sary, who heads at least four breakaway Khmer Rouge
divisions in Cambodia's northwestern Phnom Malai and Pailin
areas, said he did know if the government would grant him a royal
pardon for the death sentence on his head.

Hun Sen said last week that Ieng Sary should get a royal
pardon.

The dissident leader also insisted he had not been involved in
genocide during the Khmer Rouge rule.

"Pol Pot was the sole figure who held the absolute power
during the period of 1975-1979," he told the news conference.

"He was the sole person who ordered the troops (guerrillas)
and everyone to do what he wanted, including killing the people.

"As foreign minister, I had no power, and did not get involved
in any crime of killing people,"

He said his rift with Pol Pot began in early 1990, when the
hardline faction did not allow him to participate in peace
negotiations with other factions waging a war with the then
government in Phnom Penh.

Those early peace talks initiated the Paris Peace Accord of
July 1991, which led to the formation of an interim government
before the UN-sponsored elections in 1993.