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Kampucheans in and around Phnom Penh express relief that the Pol Pot era has ended, but that
relief is mixed with apprehension about the Vietnamese presence and fear of famine. They also
wonder how long it will be before the international community recognizes their plight and comes
to their assistance.
Those are among impressions gathered from a five-day visit to Kampuchea in mid-April. The visit
was limited to the Phnom Penh area and the towns along Highway One, which connects the Kampuchean
capital with Vietnam. In Phnom Penh, officials offered little information on conditions in the
country as a whole, and an assessment of the security situation in the west proved impossible.
But in the east and near Phnom Penh, a solid administrative structure appeared to be functioning,
and security seemed assured. The 10-hour journey from Ho Chi Minh City to Phnom Penh was completed
in a Ford-built "Ho Chi Minh City Tourist Office" van without the benefit of any security escort.
Traveling to the capital before last month's Cambodian New Year holiday, there was much evidence
of the chaos caused by the unruly movements of people described by earlier
travelers to Kampuchea
(REVIEW, Apr. 13). People carrying their few possessions trudging along on foot and others more
fortunate, with families in bullock carts, clogged the highway. Apparently people, encouraged by
government radio broadcasts, were still moving about in search of families and seeking homes in
the towns and villages they were forced to leave when the Pol Pot regime came to power four years
ago.
On the return trip, however, after the New Year celebrations, the movement had ceased. Mass meetings
were being held in the villages, and people could be seen repairing houses along the road -- signs
that the population was beginning to settle down.
Around the capital, President Heng Samrin's government has organized a ring of temporary settlements
for former residents of Phnom Penh wishing to re-enter the city. Three of the half-dozen-or-so
settlements said to exist were visited. Each camp has as few as 6,000 people or as many as
60,000. According to residents, the settlements have become screening centers
for the government
effort to rebuild some sort of administration. Gradually people from the settlements are selected
and admitted to Phnom Penh.
The selection appears to be carried out along highly practical lines. Doctors, nurses, technicians
and administrators are sought. If, during interviews, they can establish their skills and former
residency in Phnom Perth, they are assigned jobs in the capital. This correspondent met former
bankers who had been appointed to the newly-established Ministry of Health and Welfare, and
former Phnom Penh University students who had been assigned to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Some 60 of these selected people now reside in the old Calmette Hospital, a few blocks from the
old French Embassy.
Before being given assignments in the city, those selected are required to attend a two to
three-week re-education course in Phnom Penh. The course contains lectures on the l1-point
programme of the Kampuchean National United Front for National Salvation (KNUFNS) and general
orientation on the goals of socialism. The programme pledges among other things to
build "genuine socialism" and abolish the "compulsory work and eat together system" of the Pol Pot
regime, to establish banks and issue currency, and to "welcome soldiers and public
servants of previous regimes into a government of national reconciliation."
In a bid for support, the Phnom Penh government has encouraged the return of basic Khmer values.
The Buddhist religion, once central to Kampuchean life, appears to be making a strong comeback.
Most pagodas were said to have been desecrated during the Pol Pot regime. Last month's visitors
attended Buddhist services in a makeshift temple built in an old schoolyard.
What was quite striking was the reappearance of colorful clothing and sarongs. The basic Khmer
Rouge black was being quietly replaced. Music and dance has also returned to Phnom Penh. During
the New Year's holiday both traditional Kampuchean ballet and popular dances were re-introduced.
But the Phnom Penh government has found it difficult to find people qualified to stage these
revivals.
The radical policies of the Pol Pot regime have left few bonzes to carry on religion and few
artists to revive the country's cultural heritage. In attempting to organize
national ballet
performances, the government found only a handful from the old Khmer Royal Ballet. One showed
a 1975 photo of herself in complete costume. The photograph, she said, had been
hidden for four years while she was hoping to dance again one day. But the 28-year-old
woman, who looked more like 40, obviously suffering from malnutrition, said she was now too ill to dance.
The suburban settlement at Chang Chamras, or Kilometer Seven, northwest of Phnom Penh on Route
Five, is the largest of the processing centers for former city residents. The people there spoke
bitterly of their experiences under the Pol Pot regime. Their stories were similar to those told
to journalists who visit refugee camps in Thailand; tales of executions, purges, terror and
backbreaking work on rural communes. Doctors, teachers and technicians who spoke either French
or English said they were alive because they had concealed their identities. They said few of
their friends or colleagues were still alive.
There was also frustration in their conversation. People were becoming impatient with the government's
lack of speed in processing people. They worried about the Vietnamese presence. "The Vietnamese
say they are here to help us and will eventually leave," said one man recently appointed to a
government position, "but with so few Khmers alive with the education to take control of government,
we know they will not leave for a long time."
But if building an administration was a problem, another, more serious, was of more immediate
concern. Kampuchean officials and their Vietnamese advisers seemed well aware that, if a serious
food crisis is to be averted, a substantial rice crop must be planted as the monsoon rains begin
later this month. Yet, at least along Highway One, there was no sign that the fields would be
ready for planting. The Vietnamese said they were sending thousands of tons of rice seed to
Kampuchea, but international aid experts in Hanoi expressed doubt that, given its own food
crisis, Vietnam has much seed to spare. These experts were pessimistic about Kampuchea's
chances of avoiding a major famine.
The Vietnamese admit rice stocks are low. At the settlements near Phnom Penh the food situation
is already serious. Several residents said the Vietnamese were distributing flour, while one
woman said she had taken to begging from Vietnamese soldiers. People in the camps appeared to
subsist largely on fish, eels, manioc and sweet potatoes.
Several residents at Kilometer Seven who had worked four years ago in food distribution for
American relief agencies, suggested the only answer was international assistance. They asked
when all the international organizations which were present in Kampuchea four years ago were
going to return.
The need for international assistance was also voiced by Vietnamese advisers and officials of
the Kampuchean Government.
In an interview, Kampuchean Vice-Minister for Foreign Affairs Keo Prasat made an impassioned
plea for foreign aid: "We cannot rebuild our country with only our own hands. We need the help
of socialist nations and peace loving peoples all over the world. So far the Soviet Union, Hungary,
East Germany and Laos have offered assistance. In order to rebuild, however, we need the assistance
of all the people and organizations of the world."
In Hanoi, the visitors were told, the International Red Cross was negotiating to re-enter Phnom
Penh to assess medical needs. But most diplomats there agreed that until the Phnom Penh government
gains substantial international recognition and a seat in the United Nations, Kampuchea will
remain largely Vietnam's burden and the Kampuchean people will go on suffering.
James Laurie is the Hong Kong bureau chief of ABC News, the American broadcasting company.
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