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Cease Fire – 1997

In 1997, the conflict between the
government and the Khmer Rouge continued, even though clashes became less
intense due to the fact that many KR members had defected.

There were also clashes between the two government coalition parties, the Cambodian People’s Party (CPP) government and the main faction of the FUNCINPEC. On July 7, 1997, Hun Sen, the leader of the CPP, overthrew Prime Minister Norodom Ranariddh in a brutal, bloody coup. Two days of fighting left at least 58 people dead and hundreds wounded. Ranariddh’s forces were overwhelmed. In the days following Ranariddh’s overthrow, Hun Sen’s soldiers hunted down supporters of Ranariddh’s FUNCINPEC party. Several of the victims were apparently tortured before being murdered; four of the bodyguards of Nhiek Bun Chhay, Ranariddh’s top military commander, were found with their eyes gouged out. Nhiek Bun Chhay narrowly escaped. Former Interior Minister, Ho Sok, was shot in the head while in the custody of Hun Sen’s military.¹ In late August, “King Sihanouk joined the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and Prince Ranariddh in calling for peace talks and a mutual ceasefire. Hun Sen refused, claiming the resistance fighters are law-breakers who ought to give up or be apprehended.”²

1. Bruce Sharp, “Butchers on a Smaller Scale: Hun Sen and the Cambodian People’s Party,” 1997, accessed July 19, 2010, http://www.mekong.net/cambodia/hun_sen1.htm.
2. “Cambodian king talks with new strongman Hun Sen,” Deutsche Presse-Agentur, September 6, 1997.