HUMENITARIAH ASSISTANCE Il"i CAMBUUIH

I9

Thai border when at least some of the assistance would be diverted to

commercial uses or to food for the combatants? More generally, should the agencies treat the geopolitical context as a given and interpret their
mission within the constraints imposed by that context? Cir should they

instead follow their legal mandate as closely as possible, even if that might diminish their capacity, at least in the near term, to assist those in need? These issues arose in the course of decisions agency ofcials had to make about the allocation of relief between the PRK in Phnom Penh and various groups resisting Viemamese forces from along the Thai border. They also cropped up as UNHCR considered its policies on offering asy~ lum, on working actively in border areas adjacent to battleelds, and on condoning repatriations of Cambodians by guerrilla leaders and the Thai military. To some extent, UNBRDs creation in January 1982, largely with U.S. and Japanese funding, signaled that decisions on many of these issues had been made. UNI-{CR would work largely within its established normative framework; UNBRU would attempt to cope with the humanitarian and political realities on the ground. The policy dilemmas posed by conditions in Cambodia exemplify the problems inherent in aiding, however inadvertently, refugee warriors.
Where international agencies working in dangerous and complex environments are animated by humanitarian concerns, they are apt to prize exibility in the application of their fundamental norms. Beginning in

19?? UNI-ICR received many complaints that the excessively narrow

interpretation of its mandates was eroding its ability to reduce suffering among Cambodians. Instead of wading in among the refugees arriving at the border in l9?9, the critics charged, UNI-ICR hung back, wringing its

hands about the various legal mandates and precedents at stake. American ofcials were among the most vociferous critics of the international agencies. They found UPI!-ICR rigid, dominated by lawyers, and

slow to act on behalf of the Cambodian refugees in Thailand. They argued that the International Committee of the Red Cross, better accustomed to
operating in dangerous contexts, was more effective in aiding refugees.

On one occasion, a U.5. official threatened to make his concerns public, in the belief that this would promote policy flexibility. judging by its more expansive roles in subsequent refugee contexts, UNHCR apparently took some of these criticisms to heart. Strict adherence to mission guidelines and norms may limit the ability of international agencies, particularly UNHCR, to reduce refugee suffering. Had UNHCR housed Cambodians far from areas of conict and

10

DANIEL l_ll'~liF.fl.

refused intercourse between Cambodians inside and outside the camps,

Thai authorities would likely have put further limits on UNHCR roles in dealing with Cambodians. Similarly, high levels of resettlement or absolute
bars on repatriation would have left less fodder for resisting the Vietnamese occupation of Cambodia and would have been opposed by Thai authorities. if UNHCR was to do its iob well, it had to restrict its services to a smaller refugee population. The dangers of more flexible approaches, however, included the weakening of UNHCR's perceived political neu-

trality and, as a consequence, diminished access to refugee populations in politically charged contexts in the future.
judgments about the superiority of one humanitarian strategy over

another, if we could devise an acceptable utilitarian decision rule that could weigh the diverse factors at stake, depend in any specific case on the
impossible: knowing the counterfactuals. In the Cambodian case, stricter

adherence to international refugee laws and norms might have resulted in

less aid going to those Cambodians who ultimately underpinned the resis-

tance. If China, Thailand, and the United States had then accepted
Vietnamese control of Cambodia, the conict might have been shorter, with fewer Cambodians dead. It might have ended long before the 1993 peace accords. An alternative plausible outcome would have been a conflict of comparable duration, but with less provision of relief to refugees

and therefore a higher toll of suffering and death. Chinese and Thai determination might have ensured the levels of support necessary to sustain

a resistance force but with lower levels of international relief of civilian

suffering. To determine the best approach to refugee assistance in this or any

case, we need to know what we cannot know: what would have happened if things had been different. To complicate the task, the appropriateness of a particular strategy may be difficult to judge from a
single case. Although a departure from established norms might ease suf-

fering in a single case, it might also weaken the broader regime goveming
refugee assistance and thus increase misery in the long run. We would like to know under what conditions the value of relatively consistent adher-

ence to a set of norms or laws is great enough to constitute a worthy goal in itself. We need to consider the impact of a specific approach in a given
instance on the maintenance and strengthening of norms of refugee assis-

tance and protection. Here we confront the unpleasant utilitarian

calculation: even if fewer Cambodians had died as a result of flexible

departures from international refugee law, if the costs of these departures

HUNl.|'\.NIT.HrilIi\H ASSISTANCE

IIH

CAMBODIA

JLI

included a weakening of that intemational refugee law and associated norms, would this tend to undermine future UNHCR missions and therefore increase total human misery? We nd ourselves in the uncomfortable but familiar position of attempting to reconcile the values of consistency associated with the development of law and norms, on the one hand, and the need for exibility in the political domain, on the other. As Willie
Stark comments in Ail the Kirtgs Men,

The law is like . . . a single-bed blanket on a double bed and three folks in bed on a cold night. There ain't enough blanket to cover the case . . . and somebody is always going to nigh catch pneumonia. Hell, the law is like the pants you bought last year for a growing boy, but it is always this year and the seams are popped and the
shankbones to the breeze. The law is always too short and too tight

for growing humankind. As the first of a series of large, new kinds of challenges to UNI-lCR's
mandates rooted in postwar European experience, the Cambodian case is

useful in weighing these issues.

The Parameters of the Case

The three Indochinese wars continued uninterrupted for almost forty years, and over this period Cambodians took refuge in Thailand and along its border. French colonial policies, massive U.S. bombing, and the brutal rule of the Khmer Rouge encouraged a Cambodian sensibility that saw
survival as intimately intertwined with a necessity to migrate. This chapter examines part of this forty-year span: 19?? to I935. Early in I979, invading Vietnamese and retreating Khmer Rouge forces

drove Cambodians to the border region in unprecedented numbers and eventually triggered large-scale international aid for the uprooted civilian and military populations. Aid continued through the implementation of
the Paris peace accords of 1993. By 1935, however, following the latest

Viemamese offensive and the Vietnamese decision not to withdraw from the border region, relief officials had devised their basic strategies for coping with the Cambodian inux {and outow}. Hence it is not necessary to carry the analysis forward through the intensication of ghting that followed the Vietnamese withdrawal from Cambodia in 193? and the positioning by various Cambodian factions in anticipation of the 1994 elections and the new political regime that followed.

11

DANIEL UHCER

Although the Cambodian refugees were long linked to the broader Indochinese struggles and the plights of Lao and Vietnamese refugees, this chapter deals only with the Cambodians who arrived after 1973, their ties to the military, and the political struggles for control of Cambodia. The large numbers of Lao and Vietnamese (as well as earlier
Cambodian arrivals) in Thailand were not actors in the struggles for con-

trol over their home countries. The discussion opens with a brief description of the regional geopolitical context at the end of the 19?Ds,
Thai goals and concerns, and the roles played by international relief agen-

cies hoping to assist the Cambodians gathered along the Thai border as well as Cambodians in Cambodia. It then turns to the anomalous political entities associated with the diverse Cambodian refugee settlements along the Cambodian-Thai border, issues of governance that arise when
refugee warriors exert control over civilian populations (specifically, the extent and means of taxation, provision of order, and conscription], and

the particular analytical and policy puzzles offered by this case.

Geopolitical and Historical Context

The state of Cambodia occupies territory once part of the Khmer empire,

based in Angkor, which flourished between the ninth and thirteenth centuries. Khmer power stretched east along the Mekong River to what is
now a part of Vietnam and west to parts of contemporary Thailand but waned when rising Thai and Vietnamese powers moved in from the east and west. Thais drove the Khmers east from Angkor early in the fteenth century, and Vietnam took control of the Mekong Delta by I?ZlJ. These

pressures might eventually have extinguished a separate Cambodian kingdom but for the intervention of French colonialism early in the nineteenth
century.

In 1953 Cambodia became an independent state, but about this time

Vietnamese-linked Cambodian communists became active in eastern Cam-

bodia, while Issarak groups pushing for independence gained influence

along the Thai border. The territory between these forces was in the hands of Prince Sihanouks government in Phnom Penh. About half of the Khmer

People's Revolutionary Party, the local successor to the Indochinese

Communist Party, settled in North Vietnam following the Geneva Accords in 1954. Around the same time, a newer generation of Cambodian com-

munists began returning to Cambodia from France. They distanced themselves from the older cadres, viewing their elders as collaborators

HUMANITARIAN ASSISTANCE IN CAMBODIA

2.3

who had sold out their country to the Vietnamese in negotiating the Geneva Accords. These Khmer Rouge, including Sihanouks foreign minister Ieng Sary, came under the leadership of Pol Pot. Based in eastern Cambodia, this faction was supported by Vietnamese who used Cambodia to move arms and soldiers north to south. As a result, eastern Cambodia was subject to massive U.5. bombing. The spread of the Vietnam conict into Laos and Cambodia made Sihanoul-t's cooperation with North Viemam an obstacle to U.5. military objectives. U.S. officials decided to support General Lon l*~lols coup overthrowing Sihanouk in 19'?'0. Lon No] launched pogroms against Vietnamese in Cambodia and encouraged irredentist talk of retaking Kampuchea Krom [Cochin China in southern Viemam}. Perhaps half the Vietnamese in Cambodia at the time of the 19170 coup fled or were killed. With the Viemam War spilling into Cambodia and the massive and prolonged U.5. bombing, as many as 2 million Cambodians were left homeless. For the rst time since the demise of the Indochinese Communist Party, the parties of North Vietnam and Cambodia were in alliance.

Pol Pot, however, resisted any links to Vietnam. When some 1,500 Cambodian communists who had left in I954 returned to eastern Cambodia

from Vietnam after 19?0, he wiped them out. While Pol Pot refused Vietnamese aid, he did accept Chinese aid, funneled to his movement through

Viemam. Exploiting the chaos created by U.5. bombardment, his Revolutionary Army of Kampuchea gained control of half the countryside. His groups biaarre policies in areas under their control foreshadowed his subsequent murderous rule from Phnom Penh. In the waning weeks of the second set of Indochina conflicts, Pol Pots

forces seized power, establishing Democratic Kampuchea in January 19?6.

While consolidating their power and starving and murdering Cambodians

on a massive scale ias well as an estimated 200,000 Viemamese}, the new regime's leaders kept the country isolated from most foreign contacts other than China." The Cambodians launched vicious attacks on Thailand and particularly Vietnam. Thousands of Vietnamese and Cambodians with Vietnamese links ed to Thailand and far larger numbers to Vietnam. Among the latter were Heng Samrin and Hun Sen, who

subsisted in Viemam under UNHCR protection.

The regular Cambodian provocations of Vietnamese forces, border probes, ethnic cleansing, and purges of Cambodians with Vietnamese ties

convinced Vietnamese leaders of the wisdom of an invasion {liberation} of

14

DANIEL utvottt

Cambodia. In Viemam, authorities organized Khmer Rouge forces disaffected with the Pol Pot regime. Cln December 3, I973, Heng Samrin announced the formation of the Khmer National United Front for National Salvation, which included former Khmer Rouge, Khmer Issarak,

and independents. An army of 1?,$00 Cambodian refugees in Viemam

joined with 92,000 People's Army of Viemam forces, entering Cambodia

on December 25, 19'?'3.'-- The timing of the invasion during the main rice
harvest contributed to the subsequent famine in Cambodia.

Vietnamese leaders clearly did not anticipate the durability of the Cambodian resistance or the massive assistance it would receive from foreign

governments, voluntary organizations, and UN agencies. Even before the

new Cambodian regime could field a representative at the United Nations,

the Viemamese representative there, Ha Van Lau, reportedly asked Singapore's ambassador Tommy Koh, Why do you make such a fuss over
Cambodia? The world will have forgotten in a week. It took almost

a decade for the Viemamese to acknowledge the durability of the resistance and begin to withdraw their forces from Cambodia. By 193$ an

estimated 1T"5,000 Vietnamese had followed their forces into Cambodia,

either encouraged by Vietnamese authorities or as part of a spontaneous migration. Phnom Penh fell on January 7'. As the Revolutionary Army of Kam-

puchea retreated to the border, its now weakened soldiers grabbed rice
and killed draft animals, leaving food in short supply for the coming

spring. The civilians, many of whom were in effect hostages, were destitute, malaria ridden, and in a good number of cases close to death.
China hoped to rescue the collapsed Khmer Rouge forces and shape

them into an effective resistance force that could bleed Viemam white" but needed Thailand's assistance. Long worried about Viemamese inuence in Cambodia and Laos, the Thais were equally eager to fend off the Vietnamese. To support Khmer Rouge resistance against Vietnam, Chinese leaders set up a multimillion-dollar slush fund that helped move arms along the Deng Xiaoping Trail" through Thailand into Cambodia and to the camps along the border.
The Chinese-Thai strategy also required the cooperation of the United

States. At the end of 19178, imtnediately after Viemam invaded Cambodia and more than six years after the broad outlines for full diplomatic normalization had been sketched out in the 197'2. Shanghai Communique, China and the United States nally announced their settlement of outstanding issues. Deng Xiaoping llew to Washington on January I3, and

HUMANITARIAN ASSISTANCE IN Clllilll0Dl

lj

with at least tacit U.S. approval, China attacked Vietnam on February 1?. In later remarks to Japans prime minister Masayoshi Dhira, Deng described a tar baby variant of the familiar dominoes theory to explain Chinese policy: It is wise for China to force the Viemamese to stay in Kampuchea because that way they will suffer more and more and will not be able to extend their hand to Thailand, Malaysia, and Singapore. Over time the Cambodian resistance expanded its international support. A June 1980 Viemamese incursion into Thailand, apparently in response to repatriation of refugees from the border region to Cambodia, helped to attract external support to the resistance as relief operations began to take on more distinct political overtones."* Reecting Vietnamese confusion, and perhaps bemusement with rapidly shifting Thai
policies, Vietnam's foreign minister Nguyen Co Thach in Bangkok com-

mented in June 1980 on the alternating of repatriation and open door

policies: You see, it is seasonal. Dry season, the movement is into Thailand, and in the rainy season it is from Thailand into Kampuchea. . . . To and fro. To and fro. Very interesting.""' That the murderous Khmer Rouge dominated the resistance to Viet-

namese forces and held the Cambodian seat at the United Nations was an embarrassment eventually eased by the creation of a broader political coalition of Cambodian forces on June 22, 1982, in Kuala Lumpur. The Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea gained UN General Assembly recognition in late October under Sihanouks nominal leadership, despite the evidence of its awkward and haphazard construction.

This paved the way for boosts in aid from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEANl and the United States. American covert assistance of $15 million a year began in 1932, funneled through ASEAN to

the noncommunist forces. In 198$ the U.S. Congress approved $5 million in overt economic and military assistance. Meanwhile, UN and voluntary agencies ministered to a huge population of Cambodians in various

camps along the border.

A Vietnamese offensive in 1984-85 sent Cambodians eeing into Thai-

land. Unlike previous offensives, this one had the Vietnamese dug in along the border, laying down mines. As a result, most of the nonrnilitary Cambodian camps remained inside Thailand. The Vietnamese did not begin to
withdraw their troops until 193?. With Vietnamese forces departing, the

Cambodian factions intensied their ghting, seeking to position themselves advantageously in peace negotiations, elections, and the creation of a new regime.

as

DANIEI- uivotx

To recapitulate, as of the spring of 19379, perhaps half a million Cambodians were already living along the Thai borderfleeing famine, the Vietnamese, instability, and war-or were driven there by the Khmer Rouge. Thai officials, backed by China and the United States, bolstered the Cambodian resistance. Vietnam, backed by the Soviet Union, tried to

consolidate the control of the new I-Ieng Samrin regime. Caught in limbo,
suffering Cambodians gradually attracted the attention of international

relief officials and presented them with a host of dilemmas in delivering humanitarian assistance.

Thai Goals and Concerns

Thailand's considerable experience handling refugees from neighboring
countries increased after the end of World War II. After their defeat in the Chinese civil war in I949, remnants of the Kuomintang had stayed on in

northern Thailand, eventually playing a major role in the heroin trade. Beginning in the late 1940s and continuing into the 1950s, some 40,000
Vietnamese took up residence in Thailand." Burmese had been in Thai-

land since 1949, totaling over 40,000 by I9?5.i Then, 1975 brought a
new flood of refugees from Indochina. Some 400,000 Cambodians ed to

Thailand during the Democratic Kampuchea years. By mid-19?9, 150,000 Lao and another 160,000 Khmer had entered Thailand, the rising numbers augmented by boat people from Vietnam. Thailand had

ratified neither the 1951 convention on refugees nor its amendment {Protocol) in 196?. Nor had any other Asian state.
Thailand also had long experience using refugees to serve its security concerns. In the late eighteenth century, it hosted Prince Nguyen Anh

when he ed Tayson rebels. In the nineteenth century, Thais organized

Vietnamese nationalists in Thailand to fight the French. Vietnamese

nationalists also lied French security forces in the 1920s by moving to

Thailand. Thai officials allowed Cambodians and Lao fleeing returning

French forces in 1945-46 to enter Thailand and permitted arms shipments to support them. In short, Thai succor of Cambodians after 19179 was the latest act in a long tradition of using refugees to fight for Thai

interests. Confronted with the huge inux of Cambodians in 19?-"9, Thailand

did not want to encourage still more Cambodians to move west [the

magnet effect") or to draw Viemamese forces closer to the Thai border. Viemamese forces in Cambodia alone exceeded Thailands total, and Thai

HUMANITARIAN

ASSISTANCE

[N

CAMBODIA

1'?

military leaders did not relish the prospect of Vietnamese attacks against

Kluner forces near the Thai border. Before Thai leaders had rm promises
of international support in coping with huge new refugee inflows, they

wavered on what course they would follow. Referring to the arrival of large numbers of Cambodians in 19?'9, the army's commander-in-chief
Prem Tinsulanonda said, We think we have had enough and need not

increase the size of the burden . . . when they have recovered, they will be pushed back across the border.15 Thai leaders worried about the burdens Cambodian refugees would
impose. At the same time, the view that Cambodia, together with Laos,

offered Thailand a buffer against Viemamese expansion encouraged active

policies. Its leaders therefore determined rapidly to avail themselves of insistent Chinese offers of assistance for Thai security and for Khmer resistance to Vietnams occupation of Cambodia. Thai leaders saw no better alternative to signing on to what Cambodias Prince Sihanouk would later

characterize as Chinas policy of ghting Viemam to the last Khmer."i

Particularly after Vietnams incursions into Thailand in June 1930, the Thai government hoped UN observers would monitor Cambodian safe

havens inside Cambodia. They hoped simultaneously to keep the Cambodians out of Thailand, to serve humanitarian goals, and to sustain a
population not under the control of the People's Republic of Kampuchea. With Thailands own communist insurgencies at their height, many military leaders were wary of allowing large numbers of communists inside

Thailand. Hence many Thai ofcials did not want to see Cambodians in
large numbers resettled in Thailand and were wary of accepting large numbers of refugees even on a temporary basis. The UN Security Council did not approve Thailands favored option of placing an observer mission inside Cambodia. As a second-best alterna-

tive, Thais concluded that an ongoing presence by UN relief agencies along the Cambodian-Thai border would serve. Support for this policy
within Thailand grew stronger with new international pledges of support. Economic stimulus to areas of Thailand along the Cambodian border

also helped, as did expanded business oppornmities for Thai military ofcers resulting from the arms flows to the resistance. American and UN

ofcials supported aid for displaced Thai villagers along the Cambodian
border because of the real needs these people faced. Foreign ofcials also reasoned that the funds would nd their way into the hands of high-level

ofcials and would help to win Thai government support for border aid
programs.

13

DANIEL UNDER

Since Thai attitudes toward Cambodians, Lao, and Viemamese varied, as did the ease of resettlement [it was easiest for the Vietnamese, at least

in the United States, toughest for the Cambodians), policy toward the three
refugee populations differed. Cln one hand, Thailand encouraged resettlement and accepted new refugees from Laos and Vietnam (so long as

resettlement countries kept their doors openan open door for an open shore). On the other hand, policy toward Cambodians moved along a
separate track. Most important, the bulk of Cambodian refugees remained

beyond the reach of UNI-ICR and had little prospect of resettlement.

Balancing Relief
One of the earliest questions facing international aid agencies was how much aid to give Cambodians living under the PRK as opposed to those near the Thai border. The bulk of the long-suffering Cambodians were in

Cambodia under PRK control. With Vietnams defeat of the Pol Pot regime, the international community was in a position to try to provide assistance to the decimated Khmer population for the rst time since the
Khmer Rouge came to power in 19?5. However, about threequarters of a million Cambodians were in a variety of camps in Thailand or along the

border. The latter were under the control of a UN-recognized Cambodian govemment," which represented elements of positive sovereignty over
Cambodians and was critical to resistance claims to Cambodia's UN seat

and assistance from abroad. More development and better infrastructure

also made access to the border region easier than reaching refugees

through Phnom Penh. Most aid to Phnom Penh, as well as the border, moved from Thailand. This gave Thai authorities considerable inuence over decisions about where to direct aid.
The choices facing donors were limited. The PRK was under Viet-

namese control, and it was largely happenstance that their invasion

liberated Cambodians from an ugly regime. On the other hand, the Khmer

Rouge were extraordinarily ugly. The awful ironies in these circumstances

were underlined by the fact that the Khmer Rouge's ability to appeal for international recognition and support from bases along the Thai border

rested on their control over populations of Cambodians. Over time, the

Khmer Rouge as well as other factions recognized that their ability to

attract international support also depended on their willingness to strike

militarily at Vietnamese forces, even if they had no hope of defeating the occupying forces.

HUMANITARIAN ASSISTANCE IN CAMBODIA

19

After its invasion of Cambodia, the Vietnamese govcrnrnent enjoyed lit-

tle support beyond that coming from the Soviet Union and its allies. Sweden
was one of the few Western bilateral donors to play a signicant role in

Cambodia. Initially, the international agencies clearly preferred to focus their relief work in Phnom Penh. The Vietnamese government and the new Cambodian regime committed what seems from the perspective of twenty years hindsight enormous public relations blunders. The international community was far from eager to aid the Khmer Rouge and might have done so less assiduously if presented an attractive alternative. Even the U.S. government was divided over whether it would be necessary to work with the

Khmer Rouge in order to resist the Vietnamese in Cambodia. American ofcials were uncomfortable with their vote in the United Nations in 197-"9, torn between moral principles and international law that also served U.S. security interests. 1 Should they oppose ASEAN and China, and legitimate
Vietnams invasion? Secretaries of State Cyrus Vance and Edmund Muskie

both favored abstaining in U.S. votes in the United Nations. Just after the UNs first vote awarding the Cambodian seat to Democratic Kampuchea,
a U.5. delegate found himself shaking hands with Ieng Sary and later commented, I felt like washing my hand."3 U.S. Ambassador at Large for

Refugee Affairs Victor Palmieri observed that while the United States was revolted from a humanitarian standpoint" by the Khmer Rouge, it was revolted from a political standpoint" by Viemam.
In January 1979 a partnership between the United Nations Interna-

tional Childrens Emergency Fund and the ICRC, referred to as the Joint
Mission (this was ICRCs first partnership with an international agency}, took the lead in sending a survey mission to Phnom Penh. It got nowhere.

Partly as a result of these obstacles, relief ultimately concentrated along the Thai border, helping to sustain a military and political stalemate in
Cambodia. By April l9?9 reports began ltering out of Cambodia that the main rice crop {harvested in December-January] was not being planted and that a massive famine was in the ofng. This added to the urgency felt by relief

aid ofcials. However, neither the Heng Samrin nor the Viemamese governments expressed interest in assistance beyond what they were receiving

from Cuba, Eastern Europe, and the Soviet Union. Aid to Cambodians
along the Thai border also was slow in coming, although some Thai and

foreign voluntary agencies, as well as the U.S. Embassy in Bangkok, provided assistance. Catholic Relief Services, using U.S. Embassy funds, and the
World Food Program [W'FPl sent food to Khmers across the Thai border.

30

DANIEI. UNCER

Thai officials had not yet decided how to cope with the refugees. Facing a real security threat, Thais wanted both to bolster the Khmer Rouge resistance and to get help in coping with a rapidly growing refugee problem. They grew increasingly frustrated with the slow international response to their appeals for assistance. The Kriangsak-Chomanand

coalition only just squeaked through in the lvlay 19?9 parliamentary elections, and both the military and the opposition pressed for stronger border
controls. Then, beginning on June 3, l9'?'9, Thais took matters into their own hands {although almost certainly with the knowledge of at least some

U.S. ofcialsl. In by far the largest refoulement to date, the Thais forced the international community to offer more aid along the border and to
speed up the resettlement of refugees from Indochina as a whole. For three days the Thai military boarded almost 40,000 refugees at Nong Chan and Wat Koh onto buses at gunpoint and then drove them

250 miles through the night to Preah Viharn, the sight of ancient Khmer ruins land the site of an old Cambodian-Thai territorial dispute). Once
there, Thai soldiers ordered the Cambodians out of their buses and at gun-

point pointed them through forest toward the Cambodian border.

Gunshots at their backs drove the Cambodians down a steep, muddy

mountainside. At the bottom of the slope, the rst wave of Cambodians

stumbled into a mineeld.

Foreign embassies in Thailand eventually interceded and won reprieves

for about 1,500 Cambodians slated to join this refoulement. Spared the

nightmare of Preah Viham, these Cambodians either went abroad for resettlement or into UNHCR camps. After the Swedish Embassy failed in
its frantic efforts to rescue Cambodians stranded across the border, belated interventions" by the U.S. Embassy and UNI-ICR eventually

made it possible for 2,000 Cambodians trapped at the border to return into Thailand. Vietnamese forces greeted the Cambodians who got beyond the mineeld and into Cambodia. The waiting forces urged the ethnic Khmer to return to their land to farm and the ethnic Chinese (twothirds of the total} to stay in westem Cambodia and work.

The ICRCs head in Bangkok, Francis Atnar, publicly denounced this refoulement. His remarks estranged Thai ofcials and led the ICRC to withdraw him from Thailand. One UNHCR official later suggested that UNHCRs remarkable failure to formally or publicly protest the mass expulsions of Cambodians from Thailand during 1979 must be seen as one of the low points of its protection history. He saw the incident as the

HUMANITARIAN HSSISTANCE [H CAMBODIA

31

single largest instance of forced repatriation since the UNHCR was

created in 1951.
This refoulement helped to increase international attention to the Cam-

bodian refugees, but the international agencies were not yet ready to focus on the Thai border. Negotiations with the new Phnom Penh government continued, but it resisted entreaties that it allow the agencies to initiate maior Phnom Penhbased programs. Finally, in July I979, Foreign Minister Hun Sen wrote to the WFP and other UN agencies requesting more than 100,000 tons of food. The PRK insisted that it approve all food delivery and distribution plans, that it distribute the aid together with the Cambodian Red Cross, and that the joint Mission not provide aid to
Cambodians along the Thai border. joint Mission ofcials decided to go

to Phnom Penh while expressing a willingness also to send a mission to the

Thai border. Meanwhile the Swedish ambassador to Thailand helped to

broker an agreement between ICRC and Khmer Rouge ofcials for aid

shipments to the border at the end of August. The Thai military would
move food and medicine to the border, where relief officials would mon-

itor its distribution.

After traveling to Hanoi, the ]oint Mission arrived in Phnom Penh on ]uly 1'? as the rst UN presence in Cambodia in more than four years. It found chaos, slow deeisionmaking, and some confusion as to who was prepared to make decisions. Heng Samrin pleaded with them, Please

understand our problems. Please be our interpreters to the world. After a brief stay, the small mission left, returning less than three weeks later
with over four tons of medical supplies. They nonetheless failed to gain

approval for the establishment of a permanent office in Phnom Penh.

Later efforts also failed." These obstacles in Phnom Penh and the pressures brought to bear by

the Thai and U.5. governments, among others, led joint Mission ofcials to make their first secret visit to Thai border areas. They found widespread misery there. Many of the Cambodians had only recently

completed their harrowing trips to the border region. When ofcials in

Phnom Penh learned of this Joint Mission visit, they said it violated Cam-

bodias sovereignty. The Phnom Penh and Jietnamese governments denounced the agencies neutrality as so-called assistance to both
sides. When the joint Mission nevertheless began to distribute aid at the border, Foreign Minister Hun Sen expressed his outrage by ordering the

joint Mission out of Cambodia for violating the countrys territorial

31

DM"~llEl. UNGER

integrity. Clearly, food aid allowed the resistance to survive. In response,

the joint Mission lowered the prole of its border aid and expressed a quixotic determination in no way [to] contribute to the war effort of
either belligerent party."

Phnom Penh forced Uxfam to end its cooperation with the joint Mission as a condition of its continued aid to the city. Dxfam complied and

played a central role in Cambodian relief. More constrained by legal

niceties and the obligation to simultaneously provide aid at the Thai border, joint Mission ofcials continued to struggle for permission to provide

aid through Phnom Penh. Eventually they succeeded, in part by agreeing to drop demands that they monitor distribution. Hun Sen at least implicitly accepted that the joint Mission would continue to provide assistance from the Thai border. A Vietnamese offensive beginning in August l9?9 again increased the stream of Cambodians headed west. By October, 100,000 Cambodians
had crossed the border into Thailand, and international attention to the

plight of refugees along the border increased. The large contingent of foreign and Thai journalists based in Bangkok had easy access to the border and saw firsthand the terrible conditions faced by the new arrivals. Heavy

foreign press coverage attended visits to the border by Prime Minister

Kriangsalc, First Lady Rosalynn Carter, and Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian Affairs Richard Holbroolte. The larger numbers of refugees now arriving at the border, the prior debacle at Preah Viharn, more information about the horrors perpetuated by the Khmer Rouge, growing

concern about widespread famine in Cambodia, easy relief and press

access at the border and the attention elicited by Rosalynn Carter and
Prime Minister Kriangsaks border visit in October 19?9all helped to

buoy relief operations at the border. Nonetheless, as late as October 1979, after the first UN vote keeping
the Cambodian seat with the overthrown government, joint Mission offi-

cials still hoped to give priority to aid distribution inside Cambodia while continuing border distribution programs at low levels. At that juncture,
during his October border visit, Kriangsalt announced a policy shift allowing the Cambodians to enter Thailand with an open door" and

establishing holding centers inside Thailand. The military, he said, would no longer push refugees back across the border, would grant them temporary asylum, and would work with UNHCR to repatriate the refugees
voluntarily. Although neither Kriangsak nor the open door remained in

force for long, these steps helped to strengthen the aid at the border.

HUMANITARIAN ASSISTANCE IN CAMBDDIA

At a November 19?? pledging conference in New York convened by

UN Secretary General Kurt Waldheim, donors promised over $200 million in aid. Border aid operations then expanded in scope. Even so, until UNIlROs creation in 1982, total aid going through Phnom Penh exceeded that at the border. Thereafter, aid crossing the border outstripped that going through Phnom Penh fourfold. Up to the end of 1991, aid going through both channels came to over S1 billion.

Dividing the Labor of International Relief

Since 197'5 international agencies and voluntary groups had been active in Southeast Asia coping with outows of refugees from the three Indochinese
countries, particularly Cambodia and Viemam. Before 19179 the Thai Min-

istry of Interior administered camps housing Khmer, Lao, and Vietnamese

refugees in Thailand. UNHCR operated four camps in Thailand for the Did Khmer" but was unprepared for the new waves that came in large numbers in I979. With the new arrivals, Thai ofcials initially refused

UNHCR offers of assistance. They tried to keep aid ofcials and journalists away from the newly arriving Cambodians. In the fall of l5'?9', however, problems had reached such a scale that Thais turned to international agen-

cies for expanded relief to refugees, also hoping to turn extemal assistance to their advantage. The relatively well-developed Thai economy and transport infrastructure facilitated a large and rapid international response.

When relations between China and Viemam deteriorated early in 19?9,

hundreds of thousands of ethnic Chinese left Viemam, often by boat. To contend with these huge outflows in 19'?9, UNHCR raced Malaysian boats to the scene to be the rst to reach incoming refugees and prevent them from being pushed back out to sea. As the numbers of Cambodians reaching Thailand increased, the military began turning them back across
the border into Cambodia. The dramatic and grisly incident at Preah

lharn helped to catalyze international assistance.

Cm September 2.1, ISIF9, the United Nations General Assembly voted

for the first time to allow Democratic Kampuchea to retain Cambodias

seat. After the vote, Thai ofcials met with staff from UNHCR, ICRC,

UNICEF, and the WFP. The participants agreed that WFP would buy and
deliver food supplies to Thai warehouses, UNICEF would move supplies

to the border for distribution and would monitor the process, ICRC
would provide medical assistance as well as play a role in distributing aid,

and the joint Mission would coordinate the overall relief effort.

34

naivltt. UNCER

Thais made no mention of a UNHCR role beyond trying to resettle the Old Khmer" who had arrived before 19'?9. With indications of international support, growing foreign pressure, and larger flows to the border,
however, Thai policy soon shifted. In October, coinciding with its open

door, the Thais asked the UNI-[CR to establish a camp at Sa Kaeo. Some 30,000 Khmer Rouge entered the new Thai camps by bus from inside
Cambodia. Already severely weakened, 400 died in the camp within two weeks.

To cope with these new demands, UNHCR reorganized its operations,

creating the new Regional Office Kampuchean Unit. In November Thai

ofcials asked UNHCR to establish another camp at Khan I Dang." Thailand also obtained joint Mission assurances that it would continue to

provide aid along the border for Cambodians still living there. By November, the border population approached some three-quarters of a million. Then in late january 1980, Thailand reversed course, closing its doors and barring new additions to the 15'?,000 residents in the UNHCR-administered Thai camps. Khao I Dang holding center, with 111,000 {rising to

140,000 by mid-1930}, was close to rivaling Phnom Penh as the largest

concentration of Cambodians in the world.

The relief agencies working along the Thai border were uncomfortable having the U.S. Embassybased Khmer Emergency Group playing the
dominant role in border operations. The group's staff of four, including two Khmer speakers, had vastly superior sources of information on which

other relief operators remained dependent. This troubled relief agency officials, given their suspicion that the top U.S. priority along the border
was to sap the strength of Vietnamese forces. The group's superior information derived in part from the willingness of Khmer Americans to take

up residence in the camps. The United States actively supported a successful seed rice program based in Nong Chan that provided seed rice to Cambodian farmers to carry back into Cambodia. The program was launched without joint Mission knowledge but with the backing of the Thai military, the United States, and Catholic Relief Services. In view of the program's paternity, ICRC was skeptical about its utility and worried about the program's magnetic effect in drawing Cambodians toward the
border. With so many UN agencies at work along with the ICRC and voluntary agenciesThai and foreign-effective coordination was hard to come

by. Broadly speaking, UNHCR was responsible for personnel in its camps inside Thailand, while the joint Mission held the lead role in getting food

HUMANITARIAN ASSISTANCE IN CAMBODIA

35

and medical attention to diverse camps near the border. Along the border, various Cambodian resistance and bandit groups continued to move relatively unrestricted. The Thai military provided soldiers in Khmer Serei

and Khmer Rouge camps with assistance, including intelligence on Vietnamese troop movements. In I9?9 UNHCR ofcials debated playing an expanded role along the
border and even offered to assume the lead role in providing assistance.

Secretary General Kurt Waldheim, the joint Mission, and Thai and U.S.
officials were opposed." As Zia Rizvi, UNHCR's regional head, remarked, this left in place an odd division of labor: Interestingly, UNICEF together with ICRC [the joint Mission] accepted to do what UNHCR

was reluctant to do [work at the border where the bulk of the refugees remained], thus creating the unusual situation whereby UNI-ICR was left
minding children in the holding centers while UNICEF was busy taking care of refugees at the border.""*

UNI-ICR was criticized for not being aggressive enough in providing

relief to Cambodians as well as for violating several of its statutes. Some charged that it failed to seek a permanent solution" for refugees and

allowed Cambodians to return, in many cases under coercion, to unsafe

conditions in Cambodia. And Zia Rizvi did not help matters when he

stated in March I980 that the conditions prevailing in the country to

which the individual wishes to return are immaterial. . . . It cannot be

UNI-ICRs role to provide information on conditions in the country of origin.5 As noted earlier, UNHCR had refused to establish a border

presence and thus reduced the protection available to the Cambodians there. In later contexts such as Rwanda, northern Iraq, and Yugoslavia,
however, UNHCR did try to respond to such criticisms.

The joint Mission, voluntary agencies, and the UNI-ICR all tried to expand their roles inside Cambodia. However, when the Heng Samrin government sought UNI-ICR aid in August I930 for 300,000 repatriated

refugees inside Cambodia, U.S. ofcials opposed the idea, viewing it as an

effort to get implicit international recognition on the eve of the second UN General Assembly vote on Cambodian representation. UNHCR eventually agreed to a considerably scaled-down program of assistance. By 1934 some 400,000 Cambodians had returned home on their own. While political

stalemate continued to block UN development {as opposed to relief"} aid,

UNHCR was allowed to implement reintegration projects in Cambodia.

By 1980 the joint Mission was providing food aid to over half a million Cambodians along the border while UNI-ICR was caring for another

35

DANIEL UNCER

150,000 refugees inside Thailand. In addition, the joint Mission was shipping 10,000 metric tons of food to Phnom Penh each month, although

distribution was very slow. Among the most pressing problems in providing aid along the border was control over the distribution and

monitoring of food aid.

Food Distribution
Providing relief from bases in Phnom Penh presented a variety of logistical and political problems. Communications and transport infrastrucnire

were rudimentary, and the PRK had limited intemational backing. Despite
charges of widespread I-RK diversion of food aid to military forces, even

to Vietnam itself, there was little hard evidence to back this charge.
Nonetheless, by mid-1930 it was clear that Cambodia did not face a

famine, and its political isolation ensured that the food program would not expand further.
Conditions along the border were very different. Diversion of food aid

to guerrillas was widespread. The border population {and hence the resis-

tance] could not sustain itself without food aid. Thai leaders were not
prepared to assutne the burden of feeding nearly a million Cambodians on their border. The international agencies devised a variety of schemes to

feed the civilians and keep aid from the warriors and by 1983 were able to reduce the extent of diversion. Ultimately, however, relief operations
were crucial in supporting the resistance.

During the early months of international food aid along the border, the leaders of existing Serei camps vastly expanded their resource base by taking on the distribution of foreign food to Cambodian refugees. Jan
Saren, for example, presented himself to the joint Mission ready to under-

take food distribution in Mak Mun. He had been opposing the Khmer

Rouge along the border since I915 but had been pushed out by other
resistance leaders. He then took refuge in the monastery of a right-wing Thai abbot {Kittiwuttol and, using links with the Thai military, estab-

lished himself in the border trade in gold, gems, arms, and timber. After the arrival of intemational relief operations, he reported that the population in his camp had risen to 300,000 IICRC had estimated 8?,000 one month earlier). As a result, Van Saren was able to procure more food supplies until two weeks later agency officials realized the extra rice was being diverted. In some cases, the rice ended up back in the hands of the

HUMANITARIAN ASSISTANCE IN CAMBODIA

3?

Thai traders, who sold it to joint Mission officials, with Thai military
officers reportedly taking a cut.

Camp leaders and some Thai military officers were reluctant to lose this business. When joint Mission persoruiel attempted to move refugees from Mak Mun to Khao I Dang, Van Saren resisted. In-Sakhan, another merchant guerrilla, controlled Nong Samet camp. To discourage civilians from leaving these camps for Khao I Dang, he and Van Saren spread harrowing tales of imprisonment and enslavement there. Serei leaders worried that lower head counts would decrease the allotments of food aid they
received. Residents had to make payments to leave these camps.

The joint Mission enjoyed greater success in Kong Sileahs camp at

Nong Chan. This was the site of the land bridge by which food aid was

carried back into the Cambodian interior by some 6,000 people a day. The
land bridge, however, drove down rice prices in Mak Mun, prompting

Van Saren and his Minister of Defense, Gary Ferguson, to launch an attack on Nong Chan {there were rumors that some Thai military helped coordinate the attack}.
joint Iviission surveys in late 19?? and early I930 suggested that about

half the food assistance was going straight to the soldiers. A UNICEF progress report found the situation totally unacceptable and promised that everything necessary will be done to stop this kind of corruption, using food supplies as a weapon. Aid ofcials canceled food deliveries to
the Serei camps temporarily. An even more alarming survey in February

1980 suggested that only one-fifth or less of aid was reaching the intended
beneficiaries. After Thai military forces moved to end fighting among

Cambodian factions in March 1930, these early Serei leaders and their
cronies disappeared. By that time diversion of food supplies was so widespread that malnutrition was extensive among children. During these months, relief agencies regularly experimented with different approaches

to monitoring aid distribution and began to experience some success at Nong Samet. At the same time, early joint Mission efforts to implement
direct distribution of food aid in the Khmer Serei camps were generally

unsuccessful. Arriving trucks defended by Thai soldiers, twenty to a truck, were mobbed by crowds. The Thai soldiers clubbed women and children before being overcome and giving up. In the end, Iimer ghters received the bulk of the rice. The lack of security hampered the monitoring of food distribution. The constant threat of Viemamese strikes created divisions within the

38

DANIEL UNGER

Thai military and the relief agencies and put a clamp on the numbers of personnel from voluntary agencies being sent to the camps. Conditions
became uncertain for the camp soldiers as well as the civilian residents.
They fought skirmishes with other Serei and with the Khmer Rouge and

feared attacks from Vietnamese forces. Thai military officers used them for
their own ends and on occasion shelled their camps or elitninated them.

Thai and foreign efforts eventually resulted in the creation of a more unified Khmer Serei {KPNLF} leadership that brought somewhat more
stability to these camps.

The principal Khmer Rouge camps along the border were located at
Nong Prue, Tap Prik, and Khao Din. By mid-1930 there were an estimated 45,000 Cambodians in the Khmer Rouge camps, about two-thirds of them women and children. Initially the agencies encountered fewer prob-

lems distributing food in these camps. These camps had no markets and high levels of control. Although there was far less diversion of food supplies as a result, the Khmer Rouge cooperative spirit weakened with the attempt to start direct distribution. The camp leaders worried that gath-

ering large numbers of people in open spaces would invite Viemamese attack. By the fall of 1930, following another Vietnamese offensive,
UNICEF reverted again to indirect distribution to those camps.

Paving the Way for UNBRO

By April I930 relief ofcials had clear evidence of declining malnutrition,

increasing self-sufficiency, and enhanced fighting effectiveness in the

CCDK camps as the Khmer Rouge escalated attacks on Vietnamese

forces. The joint Mission felt more and more uncomfortable as the political character and context of assistance grew more pronounced. Now that the refugees had overcome the desperate straits of the previous fall, they
had become more effective warriors. As a result, UNICEF became more wary of its successful operations. The ICRC was uneasy about the work

of the voluntary agencies in the seed rice program, but it was ready to tum over responsibility to them for distributions to Khmer Rouge camps south
of Aranyaprathet.

Concerns about assisting the Khmer Rouge came to a head in june

1980 when Vietnamese forces launched an attack across the Thai border and disrupted aid activities. By that time, the Khmer Rouge clearly were

healthier and more effective ghters and therefore were apt to invite Viet-

HUMANITARIAN ASSISTANCE IN CAMBODIA

3.9

namese attacks. At the same time, ongoing repatriation schemes, discussed in the next section, contributed to Khmer Rouge numbers and Viemamese enmity. Two hundred Vietnamese soldiers attacked Malt Mun on june 23 and herded half the refugees there back across the border into Cambodia. Following the Vietnamese attack into Thailand, the joint Mission suspended its assistance to the border region. Concerned about a possible larger invasion, Thailand temporarily stopped aid shipments to the border, where Cambodians, bogged down during the rainy season, were

stricken by conjunctivitis, malaria, and typhus. At this juncture, the ICRC froze its aid to the camps along the border, leaving UNICEF to play that role alone. By late june, UNICEF was working with Christian Outreach, World Relief, and CARE staff to distribute aid.
In protest of the joint Missions decision to suspend food distribution

in Khmer Rouge camps following Vietnamese attacks, the Thais held back the missions shipments and airlifts to Phnom Penh and threatened to
encourage similar bans from Indonesia and Malaysia. They also threatened to suspend all border aid if distributions to the Khmer Rouge were not resumed lthe latter made up some 20,000 to 30,000 of a total of over

200,000 aid recipients along the border). Eventually the Thais relented, in part as a result of pressure from U.S. ofcials concemed about perceptions abroad, and in part because Thais had developed alternative mechanisms
for funneling aid to the Khmer Rouge. By this time the political cast of border aid was evident. The popula-

tion of Cambodians was coming under the control of the resistance

factions, who were consolidating their control slowly and moving equally
slowly toward the creation of a broad coalition of resistance forces. This

broad coalition, in turn, was tied ever more closely to a loose ChineseThai-U.S. coalition. In this context, the international agencies were reluctant to provide food aid that clearly was being diverted to fighters.

In any case, fear of widespread famine among the refugee population had
subsided. As various key agencies moved to end their participation in distributing border aid, Thai and U.S. officials worked to cobble together alternative arrangements, sustaining operations even as various institutional elements fell away. This situation persisted until I932, at which

point UNBRO, with the WFP at its core, took over border aid operations.
The joint Mission wanted out of its border roles that were provoking authorities in Phnom Penh, fueling black markets in aid goods along the

border, and helping combatants, including the Khmer Rouge. Concerned

EIIICERPTS FRO H

Refugee Manipulation
"This book ls about what may be called the darit side of intemational institutions. its contributors explore how a well-established intemational institution, the refugee regime, which has provided
comfort and safety to millions of victims of political, religious, and ethnic persecution and violence, has also been cynically used by states and waning parties in civil wars to further their

own self-interest, in ways that exacerbate war, suffering, and misery."

-STEPHEN loiiti Sreosiati alto Fnto Tamil-:tt

"By mixing refugees and warriors, providing aid through the long duration of the conict, placing camps near battle zones, tolerating violations of terms of asylum, and splitting .. . camps, international agencies accepted terms dictated by Thai authorities and the resistance,
particularly the lthmer Rouge." Diui|ti Urtoen

"The arrival of several million [Afghan] refugees on its territory posed several major threats to Pakistans well-being. In order of ascending importance, the areas at potential rislt were the
environment, the economy, domestic security, and most important, Pakistan's geopolitical

security."
FHEDliRlC Emilie

"Ignorance of the [Rwandan] conicts history and the nature of its media coverage led many
media watchers to identify all of the refugees as victims who had ed to escape the genocide. in compassion for their plight, illlestern publlcs overlooked the fact that this exodus included not only innocent refugees but also genocidal killers." -Howaau ADELHAH

"Military attaclts upon refugees, egregious politicization of refugee settlements, and the
presence of war criminals and combatants in refugee camps are all contrary to the norms of intemational law. The fact that political and military interference in the protection of refugee

settlements is widespread demonstrates a chasm between the theory of intemational refugee law and the actual behavior of states, international organizations, and other actors. "
- HARGARET E. HCGUIHHESS

STEP!-IEII lot-in Sreorun is senior fellow and acting codirectdr at the Center for intemational Security and cooperation, Stanford university. Fneo Trunten ls deputy director for Academic Affairs at the eneva Centre for Security Policy.
Brool-tings Institution Press

Washington, D.t. www.broolrings.edu

Cover photograph: Refugees from Rwanda eeing into

ISBN 0 B15? S0015

I H

_ ,-,.,,

I l
Tanzania. courtesy of Ulllililvanos l-loumtzis (over design by Beth Schleno

l
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