Distant Voices (77 page)

53
Ibid., p. 4.

54
See Raoul M. Jennar, ‘Cambodian Chronicles (I), Fourteen Days which shook Cambodia' and ‘Cambodian Chronicles (II), The very first steps towards a fragile peace', European Far Eastern Research Center, Brussels, December 5, 1991/March 15, 1992.

55
The
Washington Post
, April 29, 1989.

56
Elizabeth Becker,
When the War Was Over
, Simon and Schuster, New York, 1986.

57
Official Records
, UN General Assembly Thirteenth Session, October 6, 1975.

58
Transcript of Sihanouk's press conference, January 7, 1979, cited and analysed by Ben Kiernan,
The Cambodian Genocide: Issues and Responses
, pp. 25, 26.

59
Ben Kiernan,
Cambodia's Missed Chance
, p. 9.

60
Peter Jennings Reporting
, ABC News, April 26, 1990.

61
Vanity Fair
, April 1990.

62
John Pedler,
Cambodia: A Report on the International and Internal Situation and the Future Outlook
, NGO Forum on Kampuchea, London, April, 1989.

63
The
Washington Post
, April 29, 1989.

64
The
New York Times
, May 14, 1989.

65
Cambodia Year Ten
, Central Television, 1989.

66
Cambodia Study Group,
Resumé of Selected Collaborative Battles, Cambodia
1988–90. Copyright Cambodia Study Group 1990.

67
Affidavit sworn by John Pedler at Rome, June 14, 1991.

68
The
Washington Post
, February 28, 1991.

69
Newsday
, March 7, 1991.

70
See Thomas Kiernan,
Citizen Murdoch: The unexpurgated story of Rupert Murdoch – the world's most powerful and controversial media head
, Dodd, Mead & Company, New York, 1986, pp. 237–50.

71
Memo from Rosie Waterhouse to Robin Morgan, May 1988, cited by Roger Bolton,
Death on the Rock and other stories
, W. H. Allen, London, 1990, p. 29.

72
Ibid.

73
As told to Jane Hill.

74
See
Heroes
, Chapters 35 and 36.

75
The
Guardian
, January 8, 1980.

76
See
Heroes
, Chapters 35 and 36.

77
Ibid., p. 429.

78
‘Pottiness of Pilger', letter by Derek Tonkin,
Sunday Times
, March 17, 1991.

79
Letter from David Colvin to the author, May 9, 1991.

80
Letter from the author to David Colvin, May 13, 1991.

81
Letter from David Munro to William Shawcross, May 14, 1991; Ben Kiernan,
The Cambodian Genocide, 1975–1979: A Critical Review
, Yale paper, 1991, p. 19.

82
The
Observer
, March 24, 1991.

83
The Quality of Mercy: Cambodia, Holocaust and Modern Conscience
, Andre Deutsch, London, 1984.

84
New Left Review
, no. 152, July–August 1985.

85
Report by Finnish Inquiry commissioners, cited by Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky in
Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media
, Pantheon, 1988, p. 263.

86
William Shawcross,
The Quality of Mercy
, pp. 181, 182.

87
Ben Kiernan,
The Cambodian Genocide, 1975–1979: A Critical Review
, pp. 16, 19.

88
The
Observer
, March 17, 1991.

89
The
Daily Mirror
, September 12, 1979.

90
Cambodia Year One
, Associated Television, 1980.

91
The
Washington Post,
March 18, 1980. I have taken this, and following examples, from
Heroes
.

92
New York Review of Books
, January 24, 1980.

93
James Reston, ‘Is there no Pity?'
New York Times,
December 12, 1979.

94
Interview in
The Eagle, The Dragon, The Bear and Kampuchea
, Central Television, 1983.

95
The
Far Eastern Economic Review
, January 4, 1980.

96
Letter from William Shawcross to the author, January 27, 1983.

97
Heroes
, p. 411.

98
Written parliamentary answer by the Armed Forces Minister, Archie Hamilton; the
Guardian,
June 27, 1991.

99
The
Spectator,
March 23 and May 4, 1991. Chris Mullin wrote to the
Spectator
on July 23, 1991: ‘No doubt Mr Tonkin will argue that the KPNLF and the Sihanouk army are not terrorists, a subtlety which will, I imagine, be lost on most Cambodians.' His letter was not published.

100
Letter to Mishcon de Reya, solicitors, from R. A. D. Jackson, Assistant Treasury Solicitor, June 25, 1991, accompanied by High Court documents.

101
High Court Public Immunity Certificate signed by Tom King, Defence Secretary, June 25, 1991.

102
Overheard by David Munro, myself and others.

103
This is the complete text of a statement by Central Television issued following the libel settlement on July 5, 1991: ‘Cambodia is a uniquely devastated country; The suffering endured as a result of Pol Pot's reign of terror has been compounded by the wilful isolation of the Cambodian people. Cambodia is the only country in the world to be denied United Nations development aid. This is part of a punitive embargo devised and led by the United States and China, and backed by the British Government.

‘Britain's involvement has been crucial. Since late 1989 government ministers have issued a series of denials that British troops have been secretly training Pol Pot's allies on the Thai/Cambodian border. These denials have been in response to allegations, especially allegations made by us in our documentary films.

‘Last week the government finally admitted that the SAS had been training the so-called “non-communist resistance” – part of a coalition dominated by Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge – since 1983. In fact, serving and former British soldiers have been instructing Cambodian guerrillas in a range of military skills, including
sabotage, the laying of mines and other modern techniques of terrorism. In Central's film last year,
Cambodia: The Betrayal
, it was estimated that eighty Cambodians lose a limb every day as a consequence of stepping on mines.

‘In our film Ann Clwyd MP, Shadow Minister for Overseas Development, was interviewed about two men with military connections whom she had encountered in Phnom Penh during the withdrawal of Vietnamese troops from Cambodia in September 1989. The presence of the two men was described as mysterious. It should be made clear that these two, who sued us, played no part in the guerrilla training. In an agreed Statement in the High Court today, we have accepted that and made clear that it was never our intention to suggest that these men were involved in training. The libel case concerning these two men has now been settled.

‘Our film was principally concerned not with individuals but with governments – and especially the secret aid given by Western governments, including the British Government, to one side in the Cambodian civil war.

‘Not only was Britain's role made clear by the government's admission last week about SAS training – but it was demonstrated again this week in the High Court, where the government was represented by two counsel, and others, who intervened in the libel case in an extraordinary way.

‘Indeed, the government dramatically intervened even before the case came to court by stopping five subpoenas issued by our lawyers on three government ministers – Archie Hamilton, Mark Lennox-Boyd and William Waldegrave – and the head and former head of the SAS. The authority for this gagging order was contained in “Public Interest Immunity Orders” signed by the Secretary of State for Defence, Tom King.

‘In open court this week the government's representatives made clear that no evidence would be permitted that went beyond the statement last week by the Armed Services Minister, Archie Hamilton, confirming British military training of Cambodian guerrillas.

‘The government counsel – John Laws QC and Philip Havers – spelt out the wide-ranging, catch-all provisions of the Secretary of State's order. For example, certain evidence regarding the SAS and the security services, such as MI6, which might be brought by our defence counsel would be challenged and a ruling sought
that it not be allowed. The government counsel spoke in open court about “national security” being at stake with the disclosure of evidence that “travels into the area that the Secretary of State would protect”.

‘The judge accepted this government restriction – which meant that a Ministry of Defence witness would not even be allowed, for example, to confirm or deny anything about the SAS and that counsel acting for the defence would not be allowed to challenge this.

‘The defence counsel – Desmond Browne QC – described this as “grossly unfair” and a “considerable injustice”. He drew a parallel with the Spycatcher case in 1987 in which the government intervened in a similar way.

‘In the meantime, the Cambodian people enter their thirty-third year of war and suffering in which Western governments have played a major part.'

104
Document addressed to David Munro, signed by Long Visalo, deputy foreign minister, State of Cambodia, June 28, 1991, reads: ‘Report of Mao Makara (Khmer Rouge defector) . . . Nong Nhai Training Camp belonging to the Khmer Rouge, 6 British instructors came here in May, 1987'.

105
The
Sunday Telegraph,
December 16, 1990.

106
Ibid., July 7, 1991.

107
My reply was published in the
Sunday Telegraph,
July 14, 1991.

108
Letter from David Munro to the
Evening Standard,
July 22, 1991 (unpublished), in reply to the
Evening Standard
article, July 19, 1991.

109
Letter from Chris Mullin to the
Spectator,
July 23, 1991, replying to Paul Johnson's article,
Spectator,
July 20, 1991.

110
Noam Chomsky identifies these three stages in
Manufacturing Consent,
written with Edward S. Herman. See Chapter 6, The Indo-China Wars (II): Laos and Cambodia; Pantheon, New York, 1988.

111
Roger Normand,
The Nation,
August 27, 1990.

112
The Vietnamese proposed a mutual pull-back of troops from their border with Cambodia on February 5, 1978. Three days later at the UN they issued a United Nations Circular to members detailing a proposal for a demilitarised zone of five kilometres on either side. The Vietnamese ambassador put this to the
Secretary-General on March 3, 1978. It was subsequently rejected (see UN Circular NV/78/9, February 8, 1978).

113
In 1982 the Vietnamese began official partial withdrawals of their troops. In 1983 Hanoi proposed a timetable for the withdrawal of troops to Indonesia's Foreign Minister, Kusumaatmadja, who called it a ‘significant step forward'. The Thai Foreign Minister Siddhi welcomed ‘significant new elements' in Hanoi's proposals.

These elements were clarified in 1985, when Hanoi dropped its demand that the Chinese threat would have to end before any full Vietnamese troop withdrawal from Cambodia. In March 1985, Bill Hayden, visiting Hanoi, announced that the Vietnamese now insisted only that the Khmer Rouge be prevented from returning to power. Hayden called this a ‘considerable advance'. Indonesia's Mochter called it ‘an advance in substance' on the previous Vietnamese position.
Sydney Morning Herald,
October 20, 1990; see also Ben Kiernan,
Cambodia's Missed Chance,
p. 6.

114
Ben Kiernan,
Cambodia's Missed Chance
, p. 3.

115
Ibid., p. 6.

116
St Louis Post-Dispatch
, November 29, 1979.

117
The
New York Times,
August 5, 1989.

118
The
Guardian,
October 6–7, 1989.

119
Hearings on Cambodia, the Asian and Pacific Sub-committee of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Washington D.C., April 10, 1991.

120
Ibid.

121
Ibid.

122
Washington Quarterly,
Spring 1991, p. 85.

123
The
New York Times,
August 17, 1990.

124
St Louis Post-Dispatch
, January 15, 1979.

125
Lies of Our Times,
‘Down the memory hole', June 1991.

126
The Nation,
August 27, 1990.

127
The
Independent,
June 8, 1990.

128
The
Independent,
to its credit, gave me the same space in which to reply to the McCarthy article: July 6, 1990.

129
The
Independent Magazine,
December 7, 1991.

130
The Times,
January 31, 1991.

131
The Times,
November 27, 1991.

132
Source: Cambodia Campaign to oppose the return of the Khmer Rouge, Washington D.C.; also the
Guardian,
November 18, 1991.

133
Eva Mysliwiec,
Punishing the Poor: The International Isolation of Kampuchea
, Oxfam, Oxford, 1988.

134
Ben Kiernan,
The Cambodian Genocide: Issues and Responses
, p. 11.

135
Letter from J. Wilkins, South East Asia Department, Foreign Office, to C. Preece; July 9, 1991.

136
The Nation
, August 27, 1990.

137
The
Sydney Morning Herald, Good Weekend
magazine, December 14, 1991.