Untitled Document

Boston Globe, Thursday, August 15, 2002

Long-distance revolt
>From Lowell, a Cambodian leads liberation movement against Vietnamese
government 53 years after takeover

By Cindy Rodríguez, Globe Staff and Matt McKinney, Globe Correspondent,
8/15/2002

LOWELL -- His hatred for the Vietnamese government was so virulent that
at age 19 he had the word ''revenge'' tattooed on his right hand. His
left hand bore another message: ''sad.''

The words are gone. Raised skin marks that resemble welts remain - the
shortcomings of modern lasers that can't undo the damage of primitive
ink-and-knife tattoos. But his teenage anger has only intensified since
Sang Thach first learned that the land he grew up on belonged to
Cambodia before the Vietnamese government seized control 53 years ago.

''I want to liberate my people,'' Thach said from his new home here.
''We have been oppressed for too long.''

Thach, 48, a member of the Cambodian Parliament, a former Cambodian Army
general, and a father of three school-age children, recently added
another title to his name: revolutionary.

Two months ago, he founded the Kampuchea Krom National Liberation Front
and began directing a secession movement from his two-bedroom apartment
on the other side of the world from his homeland.

He and his followers have developed their own flag and a Constitution,
and have issued warnings to the Vietnamese government: ''Return
Kampuchea Krom to the Cambodian people or else...''

He wants the 70,000-square-mile region, located at the tip of the
Indochina Peninsula along the Mekong Delta, to become a sovereign
country. Already, Thach has proven that he can drum up support from
afar: two months ago he roused more than 1,000 Kampuchea Krom Khmer
supporters to demonstrate in Phnom Penh. And already he has set up
National Liberation Front satellite offices in 10 US states.

Soon, he says, college students will be chanting ''Free Kampuchea Krom''
as regularly as they shout for a free Tibet. But achieving a free
Kampuchea Krom will be a struggle, one that may get bloody.

His people, estimated between 8 million to 12 million strong, have few
weapons. The Liberation Front has just a little more than $4,000 in its
budget. And outside of Southeast Asia, few people are aware of the
ongoing turf battle in this land of farms and ornate pagoda temples.

But the Vietnamese government and many Cambodian officials are concerned
about Thach. They take him seriously and worry that his group may incite
violence.

Nguyen Duy Hung, the Vietnamese ambassador to Cambodia, said he is
worried about the heated rhetoric that has come out of several Phnom
Penh associations recently - there are eight groups claiming to
represent the Kampuchea Krom movement in Phnom Penh - and said Thach's
plans to use violence if necessary to win independence from Vietnam
could escalate into bigger problems for the two countries.

''What he is trying to do could cause a lot of problems with the
relationship between Vietnam and Cambodia,'' Hung said.

Cambodian government officials, eager to minimize the damage to
Cambodian-Vietnamese relations, have characterized Thach as a lone voice
without widespread support.

''It's not a problem unless he shows up with an army here,'' said
Kanharith Khieu, a government spokesman, adding that he does not believe
an attack is imminent. Khieu said the Cambodian government has too much
at stake in its relationship with Vietnam, including crucial trade and
business ties, to risk supporting Thach. ''Pol Pot took up arms to try
to take back parts of Vietnam,'' said Khieu, referring to battles fought
in the 1970s and early 1980s. ''We cannot repeat history.''

To run a proper resistance movement, the Kampuchea Krom would need the
support of a neighboring country in order to sustain their troops, said
Prince Sisowath Sirirath, a member of Cambodia's royal family. He said
people who want to go to war against Hanoi over the land of Kampuchea
Krom won't find any support in Cambodia.

In the Cambodian language of Khmer, Kampuchea Krom means ''below
Cambodia'' or ''Southern Cambodia.'' It's a name not recognized by
Vietnamese government officials, who consider the land theirs. In 1949,
the French transferred the area, which it called Cochin China, to
Vietnam. Since then, the people who live on the land - more than 80
percent of whom are ethnic Khmer - have lived under Vietnamese rule.
They are not allowed to teach or learn their language, and are not
allowed to hold rallies or have political meetings in the hundreds of
majestic-looking Buddist temples that dot the land.

While it's unclear if Thach will ever be able to carry out his ambitious
aims, he can incite riots or even persuade people to attack Vietnamese
soldiers. It would be similar to the Nov. 24, 2000, attack on Phnom Penh
that another revolutionary, Chhun Yasith, orchestrated from Long Beach,
Calif.

Yasith, a 45-year-old accountant, founded the Cambodian Freedom Fighters
in California with the aim of toppling the Cambodian government. He was
written off as a kook until that November day when about 70 rebels armed
with rocket launchers and semi-automatic rifles stormed government
buildings in downtown Phnom Penh. Within an hour, four of them died in a
hail of gunfire, and Cambodian authorities rounded up the rest, who are
serving life terms in prison.

Like Yasith, who now lives under an arrest warrant in Cambodia, Thach
has to watch his back. He lives in Lowell, the city with the
second-highest Cambodian population in the United States, a bustling
place where thousands of Vietnamese also live. He wouldn't be surprised
if the government dispatched someone to assassinate him here. He also
thinks it plausible that a Vietnamese refugee living here may attack
him.

''I am willing to take that risk,'' said Thach, sitting in a dining room
that serves as a conference room for the Liberation Front.

Members of the Cambodian Parliament are considering asking the United
States to have Thach extradited. There is also talk of stripping him of
his office, so he would have no power if he decided to return. Thach
says he doesn't care about his seat in Parliament. When he was elected
in September 1998 for a five-year term, he thought he could work on
behalf of his people. But when he talked about independence for the
Kampuchea Krom people, he was scoffed at.

Thach left Cambodia on June 24, 2001, just weeks after he said he
learned he was on a ''hit list'' of 153 people considered traitors by
the government. He said 40 of the people on the list had been killed
within the past year.

While it's impossible to confirm the assassinations that Thach speaks
of, it's clear that cases of torture and wrongful imprisonment still
occur in Cambodia. The United Nations has detailed evidence of human
rights violations. Domestic and international human rights workers are
allowed to work in the country, but UN reports available on the
organization's Web site say that several have been arrested, and even
killed, by Cambodian authorities.

And there are other concerns.

The real harm that may come of Sang Thach's movement could be the
persecution of Kampuchea Krom villagers still living in Vietnam, said
Setha Thach, chairman of the rival Khmer Krom Association and an
opposition senator in the Cambodian National Assembly.

''I don't support [Thach] on that issue,'' said Setha Thach, who is not
related to Sang Thach. ''The Khmer Krom movement I lead in Cambodia, we
will use international law to get freedom for the Khmer Krom.''

Setha Thach was among some 2,000 people who marched peacefully June 4 in
Phnom Penh to commemorate the loss of Kampuchea Krom in 1949 to Vietnam.
At the protest, Setha Thach blasted the movement of Cambodia's border as
''an evil plot between France and the Vietnamese government that took
place without the knowledge of the Khmer Krom.''

Sang Thach arrived in the United States on June 24 on a six-month
visitor's visa, and applied for political asylum in July 2001. He said
his claim is being processed.

In Lowell, he lives with his wife, San Pich, 29; his 10-year-old
daughter, Meta Sang; and 7-year-old son Phumin Sang. A third child,
14-year-old Saren Sang, is still in Cambodia and will be reunited with
her family in the coming months when she arrives in the United States.

They are safe here, he said, and free to push for freedom. He's
distributed copies of the Kampuchea Krom Constitution to about 200
temples in the region. He said he has scores of people who are spreading
the word about the revolution. With the presence of UN human rights
monitors there, he said, he hopes to avoid bloodshed. He envisions
peaceful protests.

But if that doesn't work, he said, he is willing to use violence as a
means.

''The will of our people is so strong,'' Thach said. ''If we have to
fight, we will use whatever we can find - knives, stones, axes,
whatever. If we have to, we will use our fists.''

Matt McKinney reported on this story from Phnom Penh. Cindy Rodriguez
can be reached at Rodriguez@globe.com

[end]

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