Cambodian

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia -- After years of indirectly supporting Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge, the United States has the chance to sever the link.For the Cambodian people, the options are not so clear-cut.The Khmer Rouge collapse allows Cambodians to free themselves from a haunting past that psychologically crippled many, and to look toward building a better future. But Cambodians will have to confront the Khmer Rouge in their midst as the group slowly moves from the distant jungles to the political mainstream.

Cambodian sculpture seems to have sprung fully developed into the world, like Athena from the forehead of Zeus, and its vitality continued for a thousand years. It was rooted in Hinduism and Buddhism, and people unfamiliar with those faiths inevitably will fail to fully comprehend its religious nature. Even so, to see these works is to recognize them as one of the supreme artistic achievements of mankind.The exhibit, "Sculpture of Angkor and Ancient Cambodia" at Washington's National Gallery of Art, opened yesterday, bringing together 100 works, almost all from the world's two premier collections: the National Museum of Cambodia in Phnom Penh and the Musee Guimet in Paris.

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia -- Pol Pot, one of the most brutal dictators of the century, was reported to be on the run yesterday in a remote jungle, pursued by guerrilla fighters he once commanded.Responsible for the murder of as many as 2 million of his countrymen, Pol Pot was being protected by about 300 armed men after ordering the killing of one of his chief lieutenants, a Cambodian government official said.It appeared to be a final, fatal split in the inner circle of his movement, the Khmer Rouge, which ruled Cambodia in the 1970s.

Citizens in the struggling country of Cambodia don't have enough hospitals or schools, so they welcome the goodwill of students at Indian Creek School in Crownsville, Var Huoth, Cambodian ambassador to the United States, told the students yesterday.Huoth, 59, visited several classrooms in the independent school of more than 400 students, talking about religion, history, growth and reconstruction in the Southeast Asian nation.His visit was part of Cambodian American Friendship Day at the school, which included a Cambodian dance troupe that gave two performances and a Cambodian sculptor whose work -- a marble sculpture of a five-headed snake and brass figurines -- decorated the library.

SIEM REAP, Cambodia -- Chen Rath was twice cursed: First, a nationwide drought spoiled his autumn rice harvest; then, the Khmer Rouge torched his village as part of their renewed scorched-earth policy.Even so, Chen Rath was lucky. In recent weeks village elders, teachers and government workers have been kidnapped and executed by the Maoist guerrillas. Five foreign tourists were snatched for ransom, then shot dead. Fifty-one village bamboo cutters and 17 loggers were massacred at work last month.

BANGKOK, Thailand -- The United States and Australia have openly suggested that they may soon begin supplying arms to the struggling Cambodian army because of its recent battlefield defeats at the hands of the Maoist-inspired rebels of the Khmer Rouge.The arms have been requested by King Norodom Sihanouk, who has warned that the Khmer Rouge, responsible for the deaths of more than 1 million Cambodians in the 1970s, could overrun the country if the national army was not resupplied with weapons and ammunition.

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia -- The first returns from Cambodia's first multiparty election in more than two decades showed an early lead yesterday for the opposition party associated with Prince Norodom Sihanouk.Although the United Nations released partial vote counts from only four of Cambodia's 21 provinces and warned against early predictions of the final outcome, the returns were consistent in each province. They showed the royalist opposition party in first place by a sizable margin, followed by the governing Cambodian People's Party, with the 18 other parties far behind.

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia -- There are 20 political parties of all descriptions battling it out in this week's general elections in Cambodia. But in many respects, the most significant -- and certainly the most terrifying -- force in the country is the party watching angrily from the sidelines.The missing group is the Khmer Rouge, known to most Cambodians simply as the dreaded "angkar": The Organization.The Khmer Rouge signed the October 1991 peace agreement, which gave the United Nations the authority to conduct "free and fair" elections for a new parliament.

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia -- With a threat by Khmer Rouge guerrillas to disrupt the election largely unrealized, Cambodians thronged to the polls yesterday amid initial signs of an unexpectedly heavy and enthusiastic turnout."

High risks are at stake in trying to implement the peace settlement in Cambodia hatched by the Cambodian government, three guerrilla factions and 18 nations. But none higher than those of the first 600 Cambodians moved back to their homeland by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees from camps in Thailand, where they have been living for as long as 18 years. They are prey to bandits, to millions of land mines, to murderous Khmer Rouge guerrillas who opposed this movement and to the ongoing war between the government and the Khmer Rouge.