Pol Pot fighting on, says Khmer Rouge radio

Press, 11 April 1979, Page 9

Pol Pot fighting on, says Khmer Rouge radio

NZPA-Reuter Bangkok The ousted Prime Minister of Kampuchea, Mr Pol Pot, is still leading the Khmer Rouge’s guerrilla war against the new Vietnamesebacked Administration from inside Kampuchea, the Khmer Rouge radio has said. It disputed enemy claims that Mr Pol Pot, the shadowy leader of a fanatical revolution, had fled to Thailand after his guerrilla headquarters in Battambang province was destroyed. The Thai Government "has also denied this report by the new Adminstration’s news agency, S.P.K. The radio, believed to be broadcasting from southern China, claimed the Khmer Rouge had inflicted heavy casualties on enemy troops in Battambang, where Viet-namese-led forces recently mounted a large-scale offensive to end loyalist resistance.

Some of the latest fighting has swirled dangerously close to the Thai border. A battle for control of the deserted frontier town of Poipet is still raging. The town has changed hands several times in recent days. The denial of Mr Pol Pot’s flight to Thailand was contained in a statement by a spokesman of the ousted Government’s Ministry’ of Foreign Affairs, broadcast by the Khmer Rouge radio yesterday. He said the report was a "distorted” announcement by the Vietnamese leadership. Vietnam sponsored and supported a huge offensive last January that forced the pro-Peking Pol Pot regime out of Phnom Penh and into the jungles and mountains. Since then the Khmer Rouge guerrillas have been a thorn in the side of the new

Adminstration, making it necessary for many Vietnamese troops to remain stationed in Kampuchea and prompting the latest offensive aimed at rooting out the guerrillas before the onset of the rainy season in a few months.

While not acutally mentioning the ousted Prime Minister by name, the spokesman said the report of his escape to Thailand was a false story, and the truth was that the leaders of the “struggle to liberate Kampuchea” were inside Kampuchea and leading the people’s war.

It said the leaders had decided “to sacrifice all things ! for national salvation and the defence of the Kampuchean people.” In its battle reports, the radio said heavy ehgagements between" Khmer Rouge and Vietnamese*-led forces in the north-west province of Battambang had taken place late last week.

It said 76 Vietnamese had been killed in fighting between Poipet and Sisophon, about 48km from the Thai border. In another action in the same region, Khmer Rouge guerrillas had destroyed a tank and two military trucks, killing 76 soldiers on these vehicles, it claimed.

The radio claimed that after one attack at. O-Chreou, some 200 Viet-namese-led forces had fled to Thailand. Thai border officials said yesterday that 170 soldiers of the Hanoi-backed Administration, who had fled into Thailand when the Khmer Rouge attacked and captured Poipet last Thursday, were still being detained in the eastern Thai border town of Aranyaprathet.