SPEAKERS CONTENTS INSERTS
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52–188 CC
1998
CAMBODIA: WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON
ASIA AND THE PACIFIC
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON
INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED FIFTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
SEPTEMBER 28, 1998
Printed for the use of the Committee on International Relations
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COMMITTEE ON INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
BENJAMIN A. GILMAN, New York, Chairman
WILLIAM GOODLING, Pennsylvania
JAMES A. LEACH, Iowa
HENRY J. HYDE, Illinois
DOUG BEREUTER, Nebraska
CHRISTOPHER SMITH, New Jersey
DAN BURTON, Indiana
ELTON GALLEGLY, California
ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida
CASS BALLENGER, North Carolina
DANA ROHRABACHER, California
DONALD A. MANZULLO, Illinois
EDWARD R. ROYCE, California
PETER T. KING, New York
JAY KIM, California
STEVEN J. CHABOT, Ohio
MARSHALL ''MARK'' SANFORD, South Carolina
MATT SALMON, Arizona
AMO HOUGHTON, New York
TOM CAMPBELL, California
JON FOX, Pennsylvania
LINDSEY O. GRAHAM, South Carolina
JOHN McHUGH, New York
ROY BLUNT, Missouri
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KEVIN BRADY, Texas
RICHARD BURR, North Carolina
LEE HAMILTON, Indiana
SAM GEJDENSON, Connecticut
TOM LANTOS, California
HOWARD BERMAN, California
GARY ACKERMAN, New York
ENI F.H. FALEOMAVAEGA, American Samoa
MATTHEW G. MARTINEZ, California
DONALD M. PAYNE, New Jersey
ROBERT ANDREWS, New Jersey
ROBERT MENENDEZ, New Jersey
SHERROD BROWN, Ohio
CYNTHIA A. McKINNEY, Georgia
ALCEE L. HASTINGS, Florida
PAT DANNER, Missouri
EARL HILLIARD, Alabama
BRAD SHERMAN, California
ROBERT WEXLER, Florida
STEVE ROTHMAN, New Jersey
BOB CLEMENT, Tennessee
BILL LUTHER, Minnesota
JIM DAVIS, Florida
LOIS CAPPS, California
RICHARD J. GARON, Chief of Staff
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MICHAEL H. VAN DUSEN, Democratic Chief of Staff
Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific
DOUG BEREUTER, Nebraska, Chairman
JAMES A. LEACH, Iowa
DANA ROHRABACHER, California
PETER T. KING, New York
JAY KIM, California
MATT SALMON, Arizona
JON FOX, Pennsylvania
JOHN M. McHUGH, New York
DONALD A. MANZULLO, Illinois
EDWARD R. ROYCE, California
HOWARD L. BERMAN, California
ENI F.H. FALEOMAVAEGA, American Samoa
ROBERT E. ANDREWS, New Jersey
SHERROD BROWN, Ohio
MATTHEW G. MARTINEZ, California
ALCEE L. HASTINGS, Florida
ROBERT WEXLER, Florida
LOIS CAPPS, California
MIKE ENNIS, Subcommittee Staff Director
RICHARD KESSLER, Democratic Professional Staff Member
DAN MARTZ, Counsel
ALICIA O'DONNELL, Staff Associate
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C O N T E N T S
WITNESSES
The Honorable Ralph L. Boyce, Deputy Assistant Secretary, Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, U.S. Department of State
The Honorable Steve Solarz, Co-chairman, Observer Election Delegation to Cambodia, National Democratic Institute
Mr. Lorne Craner, President, International Republican Institute
Mr. Eric Bjornlund, Senior Associate and Director of Asia Programs, National Democratic Institute
APPENDIX
Prepared statements:
The Honorable Doug Bereuter, a Representative in Congress from Nebraska
The Honorable Eni F.H. Faleomavaega, a Representative in Congress from American Samoa
The Honorable Ralph L. Boyce
Mr. Lorne Craner
Mr. Eric C. Bjornlund
Additional material submitted for the record:
Article from the Cambodia News Digest submitted to the record by The Honorable Doug Bereuter
CAMBODIA: WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?
MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 28, 1998
House of Representatives,
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Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific,
Committee on International Relations,
Washington, DC.
The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 1:30 p.m. in room 2172, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Dana Rohrabacher presiding.
Mr. ROHRABACHER. I call this hearing to order, the Asia and Pacific Subcommittee. Chairman Bereuter is unfortunately on the floor for a few more minutes with a piece of legislation that he authored, and has asked me to begin this hearing. He will return as soon as he can and take over the seat of power. But now that I am the chairman at last—I have been waiting for this opportunity—we can solve all those problems I have been talking about all these years.
Well, it is a year—basically, a year since the elected Prime Minister of Cambodia was overthrown by a violent coup. The situation since that time has remained fluid, and we still don't know what direction Cambodia is going to go. But let us remember that 1 year ago someone who is not elected, Hun Sen, overthrew in a coup d'etat a government that was elected, and what came afterwards was a violent crackdown on unarmed prodemocracy protesters and others. And that crackdown has continued throughout the election process.
We have seen a cloud of repression hanging over Cambodia. The U.N. Human Rights Office has been just recently digging up bodies from shallow graves. These are the bodies of prodemocracy students and Buddhist monks, some of whom were tortured to death. And we have little doubt as to who is committing these atrocities; it is just that people are afraid to verbalize it.
Mr. Hun Sen has a history of creating dead bodies. Hun Sen was a triggerman for Pol Pot. And any discussion of Cambodian politics today and democracy and the possibility of having a free government and having prosperity and having stability in that country has to be based on a recognition that the man who now has such power in that country, Hun Sen, was a triggerman for Pol Pot during the worst holocaust Cambodia has ever known and South Asia has ever known. So we have to be aware of this.
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This is a challenge for us to recognize this. Unfortunately, 4 years ago when Hun Sen lost the elections, we made a compromise. We were trying our best to try to ease him out of power and that did not work, obviously, because Hun Sen continues to threaten.
That one personality that we are talking about is the main stumbling block to bringing democracy, stability, prosperity and peace back to the Cambodian people. Democratic members of the parliament today are being forced to negotiate with Hun Sen's party under duress and threats of violence; and Hun Sen and the rest of the people there should know on all sides that the United States is watching. And while we are not taking sides as to who should be the government and who should run the government, we believe in the democratic process, and we do not believe in intimidation and violence as a means to achieve political power.
Sam Rainsy and Kem Sokha and others who have been threatened with arrest should not be sitting out there on their own, intimidated by Hun Sen. They should know that the United States will not stand by if they are physically abused or murdered, or their families are attacked, or the people who are supporting them politically are attacked.
What we are trying to do now in Cambodia is to find a formula, a solution to this ongoing tragedy that the Cambodian people have had to live under for these last 3 decades; and it is a sad thing indeed that one person, one person, can create such a stumbling block to achieving that goal.
So today we are going to be hearing from various people about what is going on in Cambodia. We are going to hear about ideas of how we should proceed, what our government policy should be. But we would hope that there can be some kind of coalition government that will reestablish the stability and the protection for people that are necessary and that will investigate the irregularities of the voting process in the last election and make a determination. There should be a determination as to whether or not that last election was, as many people think it was, an attempt to steal democracy from the people of Cambodia; or whether it was honest enough to meet a threshold which would be acceptable and that we would have to move on from there.
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But during the last 3 weeks, the people of Cambodia have stood up and expressed themselves. My office has been working around the clock with Assistant Secretary Boyce and other officials, trying to make sure that people are not murdered and that we try and give them some reason to work together, and that the United States plays a role, a positive role that is consistent with our belief in democracy and human rights.
So at least we can have this one message that is sent out in a very bipartisan way to everyone in Cambodia: We will not tolerate people murdering their opposition. We will not tolerate going back to the days of Pol Pot. And we will not tolerate one individual getting in the way of creating a peaceful and prosperous and democratic society in Cambodia, because that is what the people deserve.
The people of Cambodia must not be subjected to another ''killing fields,'' and anyone who begins the killing again will be held accountable. And this hearing was called to emphasize the fact that the United States of America is watching and Members of Congress will act and will hold accountable those people who violate the human rights and participate in murder of their fellow Cambodians.
Joining us here is Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia and the Pacific, Ralph Boyce. At the time of the July election, Mr. Boyce was serving as Deputy Chief of Mission to the American Embassy in Bangkok, Thailand; and in that capacity he routinely visited Cambodia. I am sure that he has carefully followed the elections that took place there, and I have no doubt that he will be very specific in his views about what is going on on the ground in Cambodia.
I hope you will candidly share your views with us, Mr. Boyce, and I welcome you to the Subcommittee. You may proceed with your opening statement.
STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE RALPH L. BOYCE, DEPUTY SECRETARY OF STATE FOR EAST ASIAN AND PACIFIC AFFAIRS, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE
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Mr. BOYCE. Thank you very much, Congressman Rohrabacher. I do have a prepared statement which, with your permission, I would like to make available so that I can briefly summarize it, and we can go directly to an exchange of Qs and As.
Mr. ROHRABACHER. Seeing that there is no one else to object, I will so order it.
Mr. BOYCE. I would like to thank the Subcommittee for calling this meeting now. I think it is particularly timely.
Anyone who follows Cambodia knows that there are no times when important things don't seem to be happening. It is a process that is intensely changing constantly. But I think that this particular moment may prove a good one for those looking in to see how the deliberations between the Congress and the Administration and among the American people about the process there in Cambodia are going.
And indeed we have been working closely together with your office and with the Subcommittee to try to play a positive role as recently as this last weekend, as you well know.
When Assistant Secretary Roth last appeared before Congress to talk about Cambodia, it was prior to the elections. He reported that there was progress being made when he was comparing that particular point in time with 6 or 8 months prior to that. At that point, the opposition was back home finally and campaigning. There were, I think, something like 39 political parties contesting the election. The election laws, the party laws had been passed; the election commission had been established. International observers were on their way and voter registration was actively under way as well. So it was an imperfect framework to be sure, but there was a framework nevertheless in place that was leading up to, hopefully, having a free and fair election.
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However, at the time he noted two important problems that were still outstanding. One was the issue of access to the media by the opposition parties. There were all kinds of restrictions basically limiting the amount of airtime that the opposition figures were able to get as compared to the regime.
And second, there were continued reports of intimidation and political violence.
From the perspective of today, I think it is fair to say that neither of these problems was really resolved before the election and, therefore, it was understandable that observers feared the worst. After all, the regime was basically completely in control of most of the levels of power and the media as well.
But the good news—and there is some good news today, and I will get to the bad news in a minute—was that once again, the Cambodian people turned out in record numbers, proved their faith in the process, proved that they wanted to have a voice. And on voting day—and I will be very precise here—on voting day itself, the 16,000 domestic and international observers generally said that the balloting on that day was proper.
You will be hearing from a distinguished panel of experts following me as to the details and people can agree to disagree on some of the details. But generally speaking, I think the results of the election showed that, indeed, six out of every ten voters voted for someone other than the ruling regime. And, of course, had the opposition been united, they would today presumably be in the lead in terms of trying to form a coalition, rather than the party that got the plurality still having that mantle on them. But 60 percent voting against the ruling regime in a situation like exists in Cambodia certainly seemed to prove that the intimidation failed.
Unfortunately, since election day there has been plenty of bad news to preoccupy us. The opposition has made a number of charges of fraud. And in particular, some very serious concerns have been raised by them as to the manipulation of the formula by which the seats in the national assembly are to be allotted.
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But the national election council and the constitutional commission basically and generally have dismissed these concerns. And while a number of them are certainly frivolous, we believe that a number of them, at the same time, warrant a closer look and a transparent answer, including resolving the issue of the formula by which the seats are allocated the NEC.
The constitutional council's decision on the final results presumably was based on some specific recounts in selected places which generally substantiated the original vote and, therefore, strengthened the hand of those who would lump all of the opposition's complaints in with the category of being frivolous.
But we do not believe that dismissing the opposition's concerns is a credible position and we have stated publicly that this is basically an unfortunate failure to strengthen the character of the election.
Most international observers, I think, conclude that there probably would have been some kind of a CPP plurality. The real challenge is that, in any event, despite all of these concerns, there would be negotiations of some kind going on now to form some kind of a coalition. So that is really where we are and where we have been for several weeks now. We believe that work needs to be done.
What remains to be done, first, is to adjudicate the legitimate concerns of the opposition, and there are some and they need to be addressed. Second, the process which presumably will begin in earnest later today, our time, in Cambodia—Tuesday, Cambodia time—will be negotiations for true power sharing, not the offering up of marginal ministries, while all the key ministries are kept in the hands of the CPP, but true power sharing to reflect the will of the people. And third, continued restraint by all the parties in terms of avoiding violence and keeping the process on track.
Hun Sen's initial offer to try to form a coalition was deemed not acceptable by the opposition. I think that is understandable. He was trying to keep all the key ministries. It is difficult to understand how someone with 40 percent of the total vote would end up keeping 100 percent of the critical ministries. The opposition for its part, I think in response or reaction to that offer, attempted to provoke some kind of crisis by the demonstrations which, I think in retrospect, served to increase tension, but they also served to do something else. There was clearly a move internationally after the election to simply say, well, that is it. It is over, it is generally free and fair. It is good enough. And let's move on and let's embrace the results and simply get on with the future.
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We did not take that tack, and our statements did not come out as warmly endorsing the results, particularly because of what I was speaking about earlier, and that is that some key concerns of the opposition deserved to be addressed, and second the notion of true power sharing was not really being addressed by the CPP.
I would take a moment here to say a few words about our embassy's work, as these protests escalated and all sides became increasingly provocative in their words. Ambassador Quinn and the embassy staff played a key role in containing what was already a difficult, violent period, and I think they averted even greater bloodshed. Again this was the product of intense consultation between Phnom Penh and Washington and among both sides of the aisle and both the Administration and the Congress during this whole period to try to come up with formulas by which we could offer assistance to political leaders at risk and diffuse explosive confrontations taking place between the opposition and Hun Sen's police, many of which were going on right in front of the embassy in Phnom Penh. So I would like to take a moment to note the around-the-clock efforts of our people at the embassy.
But the international community, I think, looked at what was happening and realized that—well, not to put too fine a point on it, the United States was on the right track by trying to stay engaged and not simply saying the election is over, let the Cambodians work things out after the election. The Cambodians themselves were looking for signs of international engagement and concern. And after the protests there were successful efforts to mediate them by a re-engaged international community. And I might cite efforts of Japan in the form of sending their ambassador to meet the king; Mr. Mehrotra of the U.N.'s efforts; and particularly the Thai mission led by Deputy Foreign Minister Sukhumphan, which came at a time when the results could have gone another way. And they were fortunate enough to broker an end to the violence, a renewal of the discussions that resulted directly in the three main leaders going up to see Siem Reap on the 22nd, meeting with King Sihanouk, and then the National Assembly being convened on the 24th, last week. Now, we believe that there is a negotiating process reestablished, and hopefully, a possibility at least of true power sharing in Cambodia.
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So, in conclusion, the situation is more hopeful certainly than it was a few weeks ago—still probably too early to tell. They haven't actually sat down, as we expect they will in short order this week.
But taking up a theme that Mr. Rohrabacher raised in this morning's session on Burma, ultimately it is only the Cambodians that can determine their fate and their future. We have to remain engaged. I think we have proven that in the last few weeks. The United States has to continue its concerns about the safety of the opposition politicians. We have tried to do so, I think with some success in recent days.
The Secretary has been personally engaged here again, as she has been on Burma at the U.N. General Assembly. She convened a meeting of what we now call, for want of a better term, ''like-minded countries.'' I say that because the Troika and the Friends of Cambodia process has changed form because the chair of the ASEAN standing committee has changed and, therefore, we have to come up, in true ASEAN consensus fashion, with some new name for this whole process. But basically it was many of the same countries that have been involved in the Friends of Cambodia effort of the last year, which the Secretary created at last year's ASEAN sessions.
And at UNGA last week, she convened this session which resulted in two very hopeful decisions by the concerned international community. First is to continue to withhold Cambodia's U.N. credentials, so that the seat at the United Nations is vacant pending the successful formation of a post-election government. And, second, that the ASEAN countries, on their own, at New York, reaffirmed their earlier decision that ASEAN membership for Cambodia has to await the same resolution of this political process.
The coming days and weeks will be crucial. We need to consult closely with your Subcommittee, and we hope to do so and continue to do so.
So, in conclusion, on behalf of Secretary Albright and Assistant Secretary Roth, I want to thank the Congress for its leadership as we have tried to grapple with the Cambodian issue and, in particular, for this Subcommittee's role.
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Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Boyce appears in the appendix.]
Mr. BEREUTER. [Presiding.] Thank you very much, Secretary Boyce.
We are in the last 2 weeks of session here on Capitol Hill, but because the important issues related to Burma and Cambodia, we wanted to cover both subjects today. I don't recall us having two Subcommittee hearings, one joint and one individual, in a single day.
Mr. Secretary, you will be relieved to know this is not a precedent. I do thank you for your testimony.
I want to thank my colleague, Mr. Rohrabacher, for launching the hearing, as I had requested, on time. The Africa: Seeds of Hope bill, for which I was a lead sponsor, was on the floor, and I wanted to participate in the passage of that legislation.
The gentleman from California, Mr. Berman, is returning from California at this time. He is very much interested and involved in this subject related to the elections in Cambodia. Filling in for him today is a person equally interested in Southeast Asia; Mr. Faleomavaega is acting as Ranking Member.
I would ask unanimous consent that my entire statement be made a part of the record, without objection.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Bereuter appears in the appendix.]
Mr. BEREUTER. I have these questions which I wanted to offer to both panels of witnesses:
First, I would ask whether the level of violence prior to the election allows any government to claim legitimacy.
Second, what role, if any, should the United States play in the formation of a new government?
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Third, how could we urge our friends and allies to play a more constructive role?
Fourth, what role should King Sihanouk play?
Fifth, realistically, what leverage do we have to influence Hun Sen's actions?
Sixth, what outcome is least intolerable, least inconsistent with our democratic principles?
And, finally, more broadly, what are our interests in Cambodia? What are the Administration's short- and long-term foreign policy goals and security goals with respect to Cambodia?
I know you can only touch on some of those, but I want to lay those out, particularly for the second panel, so the witnesses could be thinking about them.
I would ask unanimous consent that the Committee's 5-minute rule be amended today to make it 5-plus-3, given the number of the Members here and the importance of the subject. Without objection, then we will proceed under an 8-minute rule today.
I would be pleased now to yield to my colleague from California, Mr. Rohrabacher, since he has been here for the entire questioning, as the first person to be recognized for questions or comments.
Mr. ROHRABACHER. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Boyce, has Thailand played a positive role in this whole thing? Thailand, how would you characterize Thailand's role?
Mr. BOYCE. Thailand is in an unenviable position of geography, forcing it to have to deal with Cambodia on a daily basis. I sometimes think if that were not the case, they would take a brief vacation. But they do not have that possibility.
Certainly, in getting the process to where it is today, which is to say they are back talking to each other at least for the moment, the Thai and their peace mission came at a crucial time. And I think they modestly would probably say that they were fortunate enough to come in at a time when the situation was moving toward a resolution. I think that is probably too modest.
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Of the various international efforts to try to mediate the violence and bring an end to it and bring the parties back together, it is clear that theirs was the highest profile, the biggest risk. It was not clear when they announced the mission that they would be able to see all of the players or that they would be able to broker a resolution. So I have to give them high marks for that.
Mr. ROHRABACHER. There are 200 people listed as missing; is that correct? Or in jail?
Mr. BOYCE. Apparently, I am being told over a hundred.
Mr. ROHRABACHER. Over a hundred people are either incarcerated or are missing?
Mr. BOYCE. This is dating from July 1997, talking about since——
Mr. ROHRABACHER. This is the Amnesty International figure, and I think it is just this year.
Mr. BOYCE. It sounds about right, then.
Mr. ROHRABACHER. And we have heard the figure 200 talked about since the election. Is that not an accurate figure?
Mr. BOYCE. Apparently, we are taking the Fifth on this one. We haven't got the current figure.
Mr. ROHRABACHER. There are a significant number of people who have——
Mr. BOYCE. Certainly, who turned up in shallow graves.
Mr. ROHRABACHER. Also, there have been bodies found recently.
What is our threshold at the point that we say, you know, the body of somebody who was in the opposition party is found—a couple, 10, 20 people are found, 30, 40 people—at what point do we get to that line where we say, Hun Sen is now a criminal and not a candidate for a coalition government?
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Mr. BOYCE. Well, in my summation of my written testimony, I realized that I neglected to point out that dating back to July 1997, we have been calling all along for some kind of resolution of the cases. Since then there has been a continuing stream of reports of this kind, and they can't simply go on—even if there is some successful resolution of the power-sharing talks, we still think that, in the name of justice, that issue still has to be addressed.
Now, regarding the latter half of your question, we will have to see.
Mr. ROHRABACHER. You know, it is difficult, because what we have is, as I said in my opening statement, an individual who in his twenties and in his formative years, grew up with what? He grew up as an officer in Pol Pot's army—not just an officer, but one of the commanders of a region, I understand, during a time when millions of people were being murdered. And so it is very difficult now to conceive of how this man who—this is his consciousness, will just say, well, now I am going to enter into this coalition government, and what happens in democracy when people criticize one another, you try to realize that that is part of the system. Isn't this going to be an extraordinarily difficult thing to do with a fellow like this?
Mr. BOYCE. Well, you have put your finger on one of the key elements of our whole policy to Cambodia since the 1979 Vietnamese invasion, which is that Hun Sen and the people around him were basically controlling the levers of power in Cambodia. And up to the time when the Vietnamese withdrew their occupation, that was not so much a concern. And then when they left and these guys were left behind, the issue for the international community and the whole Paris peace process had been, how do you take an opposition, a loyal opposition that was at the time more or less outside the country, much less not controlling the levers of power, but physically outside the country and have any hope of them competing with a regime that controls all of the levers of power and most of the military power as well?
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We thought we had gotten past that point with the Paris Peace Conference, and there was a brief couple-of-year window when we perhaps, in retrospect, hoped against hope that we had found the solution. But clearly flaws in that process brought the situation last July up to the forefront again, and we are still grappling with that one today.
Mr. ROHRABACHER. Talking about last July when we talked about this coup d'etat that happened a year ago, in retrospect—I don't know if you remember this, Doug—when tanks were introduced into the Cambodian army, I was upset about that. And in retrospect, wasn't that a bad move for us to support this effort to get those—I think they were Czech tanks—over there into Cambodia? Haven't these tanks been used to keep the government in power, rather than to defeat the Khmer Rouge?
Mr. BOYCE. I am not actually that familiar with the Czech tank issue. I can get back to you on that. I would rather not try to wing it.
Mr. ROHRABACHER. One last thing, and then I will yield to my colleagues.
We are in a very precarious situation. We have this individual, who is an Adolf Hitler-type person, who is in—has a great deal of power; and as you say, his party won 40 percent of the votes. The other fellows won 60 percent of the votes; they are now sitting at the table.
Are you basically saying today that the solution is that we are going to have to live with Hun Sen and that his is coalition government? Is this what the U.S. position is, that a legitimate coalition government must be established that will then go on for a couple more years?
Mr. BOYCE. I think that our position, if you take it right down to its essence, is that if we do not remain engaged, then we probably are going to have to learn to live with the situation as it is, or perhaps even a further degradation into worse violence. If we do remain engaged, there are no guarantees that we will be able to prevent violence or there are no guarantees that there will be a perfect power sharing formula, but certainly mobilizing international opinion; getting the United Nations engaged; drawing on ASEAN's tremendous regional influence are important. The issue of the U.N. seat does play, I think, in the regime's mind. With this language we can have some possibility of avoiding the kind of outcome that we want to avoid.
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Mr. ROHRABACHER. Let me just put it to you straight then. We obviously have to hold Mr. Hun Sen accountable if he starts resorting to massive violence and bloodletting that has been in his past, if it comes back again. I have a piece of legislation that would hold Mr. Hun Sen accountable if the democratic opposition is murdered.
Do you believe Mr. Hun Sen should be held accountable if he resorts to this type of butchery of his opposition?
Mr. BOYCE. We do believe that people need to be held accountable for their actions and we are prepared to work with you to search for a viable way to make the statement that we will not tolerate that activity valid, and make it one that will strike home with resonance.
Mr. ROHRABACHER. Well, he should know and the people in Cambodia should know that if there is action, violent action and the type of killing that, as we say, is in Hun Sen's background, if that happens again, if he starts killing his opposition, he will be held accountable by Congress. There is legislation that we put forward that will hold him personally accountable if these people who won 60 percent of the votes in the last election turn up dead. And he will never be able to leave Cambodia again if he kills his opposition.
And we are focused on it, we are watching, and he will have no place to hide if he resorts to murder and torture and the type of Pol Pot tactics that he claims to have left behind.
Mr. BEREUTER. I would ask that the gentleman from California have an additional 30 seconds. As I recall your legislation, it would, at some stage, impose sanctions that would declare Hunsen to be a war criminal and bring penalties from the international community. Is that correct?
Mr. ROHRABACHER. That is correct.
Mr. BEREUTER. Should we ask the Secretary for his reaction to that proposal? I would like to.
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Mr. ROHRABACHER. Move right ahead, Mr. Secretary.
Mr. BOYCE. Obviously, we agree with many of the sentiments that have been expressed. We ourselves have repeatedly condemned violence, and we have stated that has been the CPP's responsibility. We look forward to working with you in regards to trying to find specificity on some of the charges so we can back them up. I am not sure establishing a tribunal may be the best way to go, but we are willing to look at options with you.
We are, as you know, actively pursuing some sort of international justice through a tribunal for the leadership of the Khmer Rouge, the remaining, the surviving leadership. We are actively pursuing that as imaginatively and as quickly as we can with a view toward getting multilateral support for it as well.
Mr. BEREUTER. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. I think that is a fair response, but I will ask if the State Department could focus on whether or not they are in opposition to the sanctions that Mr. Rohrabacher's legislation proposes, and if so, to convey the reasons for that opposition.
Mr. BOYCE. Yes, sir, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. BEREUTER. Thank you very much.
The gentleman from American Samoa is recognized for 8 minutes.
Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And I want to thank you for bringing this hearing this afternoon. I certainly appreciate your service and leadership on our Subcommittee on Asian and Pacific affairs. In the interest of time, Mr. Chairman, I would like to ask unanimous consent for submission of my entire statement for the record.
Mr. BEREUTER. Without objection, that will be the order.
Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. And also, Mr. Chairman, on behalf of the Ranking Member of our Subcommittee, the gentleman from California, Mr. Berman, has asked that this report stated as: ''Cambodia's Elections Turned Sour,'' issued by the International Crisis Group dated September 10, 1998, that this document also be made a part of the record. [This document will be available through the Subcommittee office and through the internet at http://www.house.gov/international_relations/ap/aphear.htm.]
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Mr. BEREUTER. Reserving the right to object, and I do that only because that request was made to me, I would join the gentleman in that request, and add to his unanimous consent request that the September 22, 1998, edition of the Cambodian News Digest be submitted for the record.
And I would ask unanimous consent for the request as amended. Is there objection?
[The article referred to appears in the appendix.]
Mr. BEREUTER. I thank the gentleman, and he may proceed.
Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Mr. Chairman, also not related to the issue at hand, but again I want to express on behalf of the Pacific island community in the Pacific region my profound appreciation and thanks to you, Mr. Chairman, for your leadership in giving assistance and passage of House Resolution 505 to provide—in essence, a summit conference of sorts with the leaders of the island nations of the Pacific with our Nation; and I really, really appreciate your help, and also my good friend, the gentleman from California, for his assistance.
I want to congratulate our Deputy Assistant Secretary, Mr. Boyce, who has recently taken over the reins, I guess, from the Deputy Assistant Secretary, Mrs. Brazeal; and I certainly welcome you, sir.
Mr. Chairman, I would be truly remiss if I did not take this opportunity to welcome my good friend, an outstanding citizen of our country, the former chairman of our Asia-Pacific Subcommittee and certainly a person—in my humble opinion, the most profound expert and knowledgeable citizen now of our country, that knows more about the Asia-Pacific region than most Members here that sit, especially here on this Committee; my good friend, former Congressman Steve Solarz.
We are very happy to have you here, Steve.
I appreciate, Mr. Secretary, your statements before the Subcommittee. A couple of questions that I have, I am sure you are familiar with the recent Washington Post article dated September 21, entitled ''Bodies in the Mekong.'' I guess this article was based on a report as it was given by the U.N. envoy, I guess representing the Secretary General on human rights, Mr. Thomas Hammarberg. These 18 bodies are now in question since following the election.
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What is the Administration's position on this report, which I think is very telling, that while the elections may be somehow proved, despite the fact that there were observers from all over the world that saw the elections; but the aftermath of the election, 18 bodies floating on the Mekong River, gives me great concern. And I don't know, you may have covered this earlier, Mr. Secretary, but—not wanting to repeat your statement, but the bottom line, what is the Administration's position on this?
Mr. BOYCE. Thank you, Congressman. In fact, I haven't touched on this in detail, and I welcome the opportunity to do so.
Basically, despite the good things I talked about, Cambodia continues to suffer from a climate of fear and intimidation and the discovery of 16 bodies in shallow graves around Phnom Penh is certainly a factor for this citizen. The U.N. Center for Human Rights, which discovered and made public this information, their investigations are under way.
We were deeply troubled to hear of those reports; at any time, we would be deeply troubled to hear reports like that. And we are in close touch with Ambassador Hammarberg. I have spoken to him myself in the last couple of days. And Ambassador Quinn, while Hammarberg was in Phnom Penh, was in constant contact with him.
We completely support the U.N. Center's call for thorough investigations into all extrajudicial killings in Cambodia. And the well over one hundred cases that were mentioned earlier fall into that same category.
We have made numerous demarches at the embassy level in Phnom Penh and the international community has spoken up repeatedly, but this climate of impunity remains. Hun Sen makes guarantees, establishes special commissions, but there is no evidence that the Cambodian Government has started anything really meaningful as far as looking into these cases or, for that matter, the previous cases that go back to July 1997 and even before that. I am referring to the March 30th grenade incident.
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So we continue to support the Cambodian human rights community and the individuals there through assistance that we have not suspended; we continue to funnel aid through the Asia Foundation and other NGOs to try to bring these cases to some sort of resolution.
Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. May I ask, how many NGO representatives were there during the election? I was told hundreds.
I will definitely ask my good friend Mr. Solarz, because he was there an as observer on the elections. Any account of how many non-Cambodians were there observing the elections? I was told that there was quite a number.
Mr. BOYCE. There were 16,000 international and domestic monitors, overwhelmingly Cambodian. Of that total, probably 500 maybe were international.
Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. How many were American? You must have a record. They come through the embassy, don't they?
Mr. BOYCE. I am told 150. I don't have that information right in front of me.
Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Is there any chance of that 150 observers from America that they would have some recollection, or by way of some record, of intimidations? Because that seems to be the common thread I read through the reports. It was an election by intimidation.
But now after the election, now it is no longer intimidation. It is killings. And as the report here from Mr. Hammarberg, you have got a bullet-ridden body, gagged and weighted down with a bag of bricks, found floating in a small fishing pond several days after villagers say they heard gunshots. And this high school student that was executed by military police according to witnesses.
Mr. BOYCE. I think, Congressman, in my opening remarks I mentioned that two of the key areas, despite some of the successes we were able to achieve with the international community leading up to the election—getting the opposition back in country and passing important enabling legislation to allow the election to happen—the two key areas where problems remain and never really were addressed were access to the media by the opposition and this climate of political intimidation. And I think you will hear plenty from the next panel, who were present during that period, as to what forms the intimidation took and the unacceptability of it.
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Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Among the 150 observers from our country, were there any giving reports to our embassy or to our State Department?
Mr. BOYCE. Certainly.
Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Was it positive?
Mr. BOYCE. No. As part of the climate of intimidation, that was one of the factors during the campaign that was never successfully resolved. My point was, I guess, that despite the failure to address that properly, the Cambodian people themselves, nevertheless, turned out overwhelmingly. And as imperfect and flawed though the actual voting price might have been, the fact that six out of ten nevertheless chose to vote for somebody other than the regime, I think was a stirring demonstration of their willingness to get out, and even in spite of the intimidation, let their voices be heard.
There is no question that we decried it and worked to resolve it, and when Stanley Roth appeared before this body before the election, that was one of his key points, which was that the climate of intimidation continues; and I think it is fair to say that it continues to this day.
Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. I see. Mr. Secretary, it is ironic—how was it ever possible for someone like Hun Sen to be the center figure of the center force that evolved on all of what has been done to Cambodia, and here this guy was the chief lieutenant of Pol Pot?
And by the way, is Pol Pot really dead?
Mr. BOYCE. Every indication is that he is dead. Of course, you know there was no medical investigation of the corpse.
Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. So no confirmation whatsoever if he was really dead?
Mr. BOYCE. Ultimately, there was no forensic confirmation. But those, including international journalists who had been in to see him when he was in his waning days——
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Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Have we been able to get by some way, reports, CIA informers, exactly what was Hun Sen's part as the chief lieutenant of Pol Pot at the time this man exterminated well over 2 million Cambodians? Have we ever had a record?
Mr. BOYCE. We don't have a lot of information about Hun Sen's role in that period. And if he had been a chief lieutenant, indeed, we probably would have more than we do. But it is, to be sure, a very hazy period. And one of the reasons probably is that he was a lower level figure than what you would indicate by using the term ''a chief lieutenant,'' and therefore the documentation of his role is something that is far from complete.
Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. One more question, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. ROHRABACHER. Will the gentleman yield for one moment before he asks that question? Would he be more like Adolf Eichmann than perhaps Hitler's top associate?
Mr. BOYCE. Perhaps.
Mr. ROHRABACHER. Thank you for yielding.
Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. I gladly yield to my good friend, but now I have forgotten my question.
Mr. BOYCE. I am a little stunned myself, Congressman.
Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. I will come back to the question.
Mr. BEREUTER. Secretary Boyce, I have just a couple of questions, and I have given you a forecast on them, although they were hidden among several.
First, what leverage realistically do we have to influence Hun Sen's actions?
Second, an easy question to ask, and I know not easy to answer, what are the Administration's short-term foreign policy and security goals with respect to Cambodia?
Mr. BOYCE. OK, taking the first one first, I think we still have, for an outsider—and after all, we are still outsiders at the end of the day as to what goes on in Cambodia—a fair amount of leverage. And I think we displayed that in the period following the election when we were really alone among the international community. I think our posture maybe even irritated some of our friends and allies, because we seemed not to be as quick out of the box to endorse all of the results of the election.
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We felt that some of the serious concerns raised by the opposition were simply not being heard, and therefore, we withheld our endorsement which a number of other countries went ahead and gave. When the climate of intimidation led to demonstrations, which led to crackdown and violence, and the process began to fall apart, I think the international community realized that leaving the process alone was not the way to go and it would still require intense international input, and not simply from the U.S. either, and therefore we have to have re-energization, if you will, of the international process.
But I think that while we were pleased to have the Japanese and the United Nations and the Thai step up and take the leads in the last few weeks, I think it is fair to say that that might not have happened had we not adopted the posture that we did after the election.
So we can work with the former Friends of Cambodia—there is a whole cadre of countries that are interested in what happens there, and—certainly with ASEAN. There are some developments within ASEAN that I think are quite positive in terms of using that organization to achieve productive power-sharing negotiations in Cambodia.
I just would remind you again, the Secretary at the United Nations took the lead in getting the group together, which took the, in my view, positive steps of making the U.N. seat continue to be contingent upon forming some kind of responsible government that reflects the will of the Cambodian people; and then the ASEANs, for their part, following that meeting, undertook to continue to withhold ASEAN membership. So these are all points of leverage. I think the ASEAN membership is a big point of leverage.
We would like to see the U.N.'s special representative mandate extended. There are plenty of flaws with the U.N. process in Cambodia, but we think that that is another area where leverage exists and should be used.
I am getting a little off track here. Your second question?
Mr. BEREUTER. What are the short-term objectives of the Administration with respect to Cambodia?
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Mr. BOYCE. Having been in or around Cambodia policymaking for much of the last decade, I have on occasion asked myself, does an issue in a place this remote, with small population merit the kind of attention that it continues to draw from the Administration and from the Congress and from the international community?
And I have thought about this long and hard, and I have concluded that it does. Probably it certainly outweighs its size if you look at geography or population. But there is a huge moral element here, among other things. Also, despite all the flaws and everything else, it is one of the success stories of U.N. peacekeeping; and I think we need to keep that in mind as we strive to move forward in a productive way.
And fundamentally the other thing is that when you have two elections, as they have now had in Cambodia, where 90-odd percent of the people turn out and demonstrate their willingness to use the ballot box as the approach to determining their future, rather than the bully boy tactics that prevailed in that country for decades, now I think we have a moral responsibility to remain engaged. That is kind of a general answer.
Short term, we have got this week—I've learned that in Cambodia the short term is usually the next couple of days and, frankly, the 29th of September in my view is the most immediate challenge and that is when they are going to sit down and start talking in Phnom Penh about some genuine power sharing, ''genuine'' being the key word.
So the medium-term objectives will probably change in the course of how those decisions go in the next few days. But I think down the road all of us have in mind a Cambodia which doesn't require constant international intervention and constant attention of the kind that it has had in recent years, and the development of a political class there that will make its own decisions and will have its own ability to run the country.
Mr. BEREUTER. Thank you, Mr. Secretary.
Does Cambodia deserve our attention? Does it deserve the degree of attention that we have given it? I think there are a whole range of reasons. Certainly the extraordinary suffering and genocide of the Cambodian people, that passes all understanding, would suggest that that is enough of a reason alone.
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I would yield on my remaining time to the gentleman from American Samoa if he has that question in mind. No?
Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Yes, I think I have finally got the question formulated. Mr. Chairman, my point here is that with someone like Hun Sen taking such authority and degree of the power, making policy situations with Cambodia, and his affiliation with Pol Pot, how is it that we were able to separate him from Pol Pot as far as being, to me, not only as a friend, but being part of the genocide that was committed by Pol Pot and his lieutenants? Did we just forgive him and let Pol Pot carry the bag?
Mr. BOYCE. I think if you start down the road of not associating in any way with individuals who at whatever level had some role to play during that period, you would probably find yourself hard pressed to deal with some of the most senior members of the leadership today, and I don't mean just on the CPP side.
Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. I am told that Yale University is in the process of translating a lot of the documentaries and records that were kept during the Pol Pot regime.
Mr. BOYCE. Yes, sir.
Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Have there been any more revelations coming out of those translations?
Mr. BOYCE. I will tell you, I am a little bit familiar with that procedure and it is going to be a daunting one because during the Democratic Kampuchea period and during the height of the Pol Pot outrages, they were fond of keeping records apparently. This crowd was documenting everything. But they did it in weird codes and all sorts of arcanery that the people up at Yale are grappling with now. But hopefully there is enough material out there, because of the nature of that regime and its incredible willingness to try to document the outrages it was committing, that maybe we will get some——
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Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Apparently, Hun Sen was a regional commander within the Pol Pot army. So he wasn't just a lieutenant or a private.
Mr. BOYCE. No, he was not a senior lieutenant, one of the immediate clique around Pol Pot, but I am not trying to say that he wasn't a figure during that period at all, Congressman.
Mr. FALEOMAVAEGA. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. BEREUTER. Thank you. The gentlelady from California, Mrs. Capps, has joined us. We are about to let the Secretary go back to his duties, having spent the day here, but if the gentlelady has a question or comment for him, she is welcome to offer it.
Mrs. CAPPS. I will spare him, since I just arrived and I will save my questions. Thank you.
Mr. BEREUTER. And if the gentlelady has a statement prepared or otherwise she would like to make, she can do that as I call up the second panel.
Mr. Secretary, thank you very much for your testimony today and for your willingness to come and respond to questions and comments from Members. We appreciate that. Thank you.
Mr. BOYCE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. BEREUTER. I would like now to call the second panel. We are pleased to have an excellent panel of private witnesses testifying before the Subcommittee. They include the Honorable Steve Solarz, a longtime and very distinguished Member of the Foreign Affairs Committee, who also chaired this Subcommittee for some time.
Mr. Faleomavaega has already recognized him. I am sure it is a bipartisan hearty welcome.
He served as co-leader of the international observer group that monitored the Cambodian election. Never one to avoid hot issues or hot spots, Mr. Solarz, in the immediate aftermath of the election, made comments that provoked some controversy.
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I welcome all the witnesses to come forward. I have no doubt he will want to give us an explanation of his views.
A sincere welcome back to you, Steve Solarz.
Also joining us today is Mr. Eric Bjornlund, Senior Associate and Director of Asian Programs at the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs. Mr. Bjornlund has developed and directed international and domestic election monitoring, civic education, political party building and parliamentary development programs in more than 25 countries. He has directed NDI's programs in support of democracy in Cambodia since 1994 and has visited the country on a number of occasions in the recent past. We look forward to his comments.
Our final witness today is Mr. Lorne Craner, President, International Republican Institute. International Republican Institute has a long history of working on party development in Cambodia and has assisted in the basic education and training of candidates for the July election.
IRI has the regrettable distinction of having one of its personnel wounded during the infamous April 1997 grenade attack on a peaceful political rally in Phnom Penh. We are pleased that your injured staff member has recovered, as I understand, from the assault. Mr. Craner has been with us once.
Mr. CRANER. Thank you.
Mr. BEREUTER. Mr. Craner, the Subcommittee welcomes you back to testify before us today.
Gentlemen, your entire statements will be made a part of the record. I would ask that you try to summarize your comments in about 10 minutes each, so we could have some time available for questions.
Mr. BEREUTER. We will call first on our former colleague, the distinguished gentleman from New York, Mr. Solarz, Observer Election Delegation Co-chairman to Cambodia for the National Democratic Institute.
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Welcome. You may proceed as you wish, Steve.
STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE STEVE SOLARZ, COCHAIRMAN, OBSERVER ELECTION DELEGATION TO CAMBODIA, NATIONAL DEMOCRATIC INSTITUTE
Mr. SOLARZ. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Let me first of all thank you and my very good friend from American Samoa, Mr. Faleomavaega, for your very kind comments, which are deeply appreciated. I am particularly pleased to be here today with my colleagues from IRI and NDI who were present in Cambodia during the election, and before it, and whose organizations have done truly magnificent work in attempting to advance the cause of democracy in that country. I have read both of their prepared statements, and they will undoubtedly go into some detail as to what happened in Cambodia both before, during and after the election.
I thought what I might do is respond in the time you have given me to some of the questions you posed in your opening statement and also some of the questions and observations made by Mr. Rohrabacher a little bit earlier in the hearing.
One of your key questions, I think, Mr. Chairman, is basically, what should the United States now be doing in Cambodia? In my view, in the short run, the major objective of American policy should be to facilitate the establishment of a broadly acceptable and therefore legitimate government in Cambodia, which would then be in a position to get on with the work of developing their democracy and their economy.
In order to facilitate the establishment of a broadly acceptable government in Cambodia, it will be necessary, in my view, for two things to happen, and I believe it ought to be the primary objective of American policy over the next few weeks, certainly the next several days, to encourage those developments to take place.
They are, first, to secure a commitment from the government to a process that would make possible the systematic and impartial investigation of the allegations made by the opposition concerning what they believe were examples of fraud and irregularities that took place both on election day and afterwards when it came to counting the votes. Without such a process, I don't think it will be possible to get a legitimate government in Cambodia, and I think we should make it very clear to the government that in the absence of such a process, we would encourage ASEAN to continue to exclude Cambodia from their ranks and would certainly encourage other members of the United Nations to keep the seat vacant.
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At the same time and simultaneously, I think we need to encourage the opposition to make it unequivocally clear that if such a process is established and if, as a result of that process, it turns out that most, if not all, of their allegations are without merit and those that are accepted would not, in and of themselves, change the results of the election, that they will be prepared to accept the results and to participate in the new parliament within the framework of the Cambodian constitution. I think that is the strategy we ought to be following.
As an aside here, let me respond to a question that was asked by Mr. Rohrabacher to Mr. Boyce about whether there has to be a coalition in Cambodia. I think we need to recognize that under the Cambodian constitution, in order to establish a government, the government has to have a two-thirds vote in parliament. It was clear, I think, from the very beginning that even under the best of circumstances, even if, let us say, the opposition had won not just the plurality of the vote, but a majority of the seats, there was virtually no way they would have gotten two-thirds or more; so there would have had to have been a coalition even if the opposition had come out on top, the only difference being that under those circumstances the opposition would have named the Prime Minister rather than the ruling party.
So I think we need to recognize that if there is going to be a solution to the current crisis in Cambodia which is compatible with the Cambodian constitution, it will, by definition, have to entail the establishment of a coalition government.
Now, you asked, Mr. Chairman, in your own opening statement whether the level of violence prior to the election allows any government there to claim legitimacy. This is a profoundly significant question and one which is not easy to answer; but let me, to the best of my ability, give you my own answer to that question.
It is incontestably true that there was widespread violence and intimidation before the election. That was deplorable. That was unacceptable. But I am not sure that it therefore follows that the results of the election itself were ipso facto utterly unacceptable, and I will tell you why.
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For one thing, it would appear—I think it is important to point out that in the previous election, in 1993, the results of which were accepted by the international community and by most Cambodians, there were far more killings that took place of a political nature than in this election, which is not to excuse the killings that took place this time—I want to make it very clear, utterly unacceptable. Steps need to be taken to make sure that nothing like it happens in the future.
There are also elections that have been considered acceptable in democracies like India and the Philippines where, tragically, many people are killed for political reasons, yet it doesn't ipso facto call into question the ultimate acceptability of the results.
Insofar as this election itself was concerned, as Mr. Boyce pointed out, there is reason to question whether the campaign of intimidation worked. Sixty percent of those who voted, voted for opposition parties and candidates. My sense is, there was this effort at intimidation, but it wasn't very successful.
Second, I think it is important to point out that a few days before the election, I met, together with Mr. Craner and Mr. Bjornlund and Jim Lilly, who was the other cochair of the delegation, with Prince Ranariddh. We asked him if he would be prepared to accept the results of the election if he lost.
Now, I half expected him to say that in light of what had happened previously—the intimidation, the exclusion from the electronic media—that if they lost, ipso facto the results of the election would not be acceptable. But that isn't what he said. He said that if there were no more killings between then and the election, a few days later, if the voting appeared to be honest and if the counting of the ballots was honest as well, then he would feel, even if he didn't win, that he had no alternative but to accept the results in spite of the intimidation that had gone on previously.
Well, I think all of us would agree that on election day, the voting was pretty transparent. The turnout was quite extraordinary, over 90 percent. When it comes to a sense of civic responsibility, Batdambang has very little to learn from Brooklyn. With respect to the counting of the votes at the time of the counting itself, it appeared to most of the foreign observers and to the indigenous Cambodian observer groups that the counting itself was also very transparent.
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But then in the immediate aftermath of the election, the opposition submitted a lot of allegations that the election really wasn't fair. On election day itself, Sam Rainsy's party faxed us a 5- or 6-page list of complaints; and I have to tell you, looking at those complaints on election day, I said to myself, you could take 435 districts in this country, and perhaps one in American Samoa, and the day of the election you could get a similar list of complaints—a polling place opened an hour late, no observers were seen at another, there were chaotic conditions outside. It is impossible to have an election with several million people, 11,500 polling places, 1,500 counting stations, and not have a certain minimal amount of improprieties and irregularities and perhaps even minor manipulations.
This takes place even in the most advanced democracies. That is not to excuse it, but it is simply to say it is a reality. The tough question is whether the improprieties and irregularities which took place were of such a magnitude as to have potentially changed the results of the election.
Here I have to say, to my great disappointment, that the government never accorded these allegations the respect to which they were entitled. The reason, it appears, is, as IRI and NDI have pointed out in advance, the government had stacked the organs of electoral administration with their supporters who cavalierly dismissed all of these allegations; and particularly given the pre-election pattern of intimidation and the refusal of the government to investigate these allegations, I don't think it is possible to accept the results as they stand.
On the other hand, even if at this late date, the government were prepared to establish a process for considering these complaints, and if it turned out that the great majority of them were without merit, and in those cases where there was merit, they ordered a reelection in those communes or polling places, then I think we should be inclined to accept the results.
Let me make another point which has, I think, been overlooked here in much of the commentary on this election. A lot of people are somewhat dismissive of the foreign observers, first because of the joint international observer group in which most of them participated, about 500, you had countries like China, Vietnam and Burma. Frankly, I don't know how the United Nations could have permitted itself to be in a position where it sent a delegation into the field to make a judgment about a free and fair election where you had observers from countries that have no experience in free and fair elections. I think it was to the credit of IRI and NDI that they refused to participate in such an arrangement, and to the Administration, which discounted somewhat their findings.
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But what has been overlooked is that there were 20,000 indigenous Cambodian observers in three separate, independent Cambodian vote-monitoring organizations, some of which were financed by the United States, and which I believe received advice and training from IRI and NDI; and it was the judgment of each of those Cambodian vote-monitoring organizations that the voting and the counting seemed to be relatively transparent and that the pre-election intimidation notwithstanding, the results were entitled to respect.
Now, my impression is, they also believed that the allegations of the opposition have not been seriously examined and should be seriously examined. But I do not believe that we can afford to cavalierly dismiss the views of the independent Cambodian vote-monitoring organizations.
The conclusions of the foreign observers were dismissed by some on the grounds there were only a few hundred, whereas there were 11,500 polling places; they were dismissed because very few of the foreign observers spoke Khmer, but of course there were 20,000 indigenous Cambodian observers who did cover most of the polling places and who did speak Khmer and who did feel that the voting and the counting was relatively transparent.
So in conclusion, Mr. Chairman, I would say that, on balance, as of this moment, we should not accept the results of the election because of the failure to take the allegations of the opposition seriously. We should encourage the government to do so. We should urge the opposition, if the government does do so, to accept the results and to participate in the next parliament. And then hopefully, under those circumstances, Cambodia could be admitted to ASEAN, could resume its seat in the United Nations and get on with the work of economic development and enhancing the very fragile democracy—if one could even call it that, and I would have reservations in doing so at the moment.
But that, I think, is the challenge which the Congress and the Administration face.
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Mr. BEREUTER. Next on the list, we will hear from Mr. Lorne Craner, President, International Republican Institute. You may proceed as you wish.
STATEMENT OF LORNE CRANER, PRESIDENT, INTERNATIONAL REPUBLICAN INSTITUTE
Mr. CRANER. Mr. Chairman, thank you for the invitation to testify today. As always, it is an honor to appear before you and your Subcommittee. I do ask that my written statement be submitted for the record.
Mr. BEREUTER. That will be the order.
Mr. CRANER. Mr. Chairman, Cambodia's misfortune continues, and I fear that those of us who observed the election as a group are partly responsible. I say that because Cambodia's July 25 election was the test for Cambodia's rejoining the rest of the world.
Based on a clean election day in the first half of the ballot-counting process, most observers gave the election their blessing. But those criteria are insufficient for judging an election.
Over the past 15 years, IRI has observed more than 70 elections in over three dozen countries around the world, and in the late 1980's and early 1990's, we began to see a number of countries seemingly holding elections for the benefit of international observers as opposed to their own people.
By that I mean that the portions most observers saw election day in the initial counting process were pristine and were judged as such by the observers. But the parts unmonitored by most observers—the months before the election, the conclusion of the counting, and the months following the election—were fraught with problems that rendered election day meaningless. In short, dictators realized that they could effectively swing an election and still get the blessing of international observers.
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Such a process has occurred in Cambodia. My written statement details problems at each of the four stages: pre-election, election day, counting and postelection. In the interest of time, I will quickly summarize them here.
Cambodia's pre-election phase, which began with a July 1997 coup, saw 100 opposition figures murdered, party leaders exiled, party infrastructures destroyed, widespread intimidation of voters, and questionable registration.
I have here two registration cards for a gentleman named Sichan Siv, whom many of you may know. He is a former Cambodian citizen. He has a U.S. passport, which he presented at one Cambodian registration facility in Siem Reapp and was promptly registered. He went to a second facility, this time in Suay Rieng, gave no documentation and there was also registered and eligible to vote in Cambodia's election.
We had many questions about the registration process before we saw that; we had more afterwards. There was also a biased election law and a biased election commission put into place. All of this occurred before opposition leaders were allowed to return to Cambodia between 4 and 6 months before the election. All of this led IRI and NDI to condemn the pre-election period as ''fundamentally flawed''.
Cambodia's election day itself was as good as many IRI has ever observed, a high voter turnout with little evidence of election day intimidation and an administratively well-done balloting process. The initial counting process also proceeded well, and it was at this point that most foreign observers went off to write their statements blessing the election.
The initial counting process was halted, however, when according to a senior election commission official, opposition parties gained the edge. Thereafter, the election commission announced a change in the way votes won, related to assembly seats won, giving the ruling CPP party 52 percent of the seats in parliament though they had won only 41 percent of the votes.
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Finally, both the election commission and the constitutional council, the initial and final arbiters of election disputes, have, as we have heard in this hearing already, declined to hear all but a few of the opposition's over-800 election complaints, and those few that were heard were rejected out of hand.
After the election, intimidation of opposition figures resumed, including another attempt on the life of Sam Rainsy. The opposition nevertheless led demonstrations, including a sit-in attended by thousands in Phnom Penh.
In the next 2 weeks at least 20 demonstrators were killed before police ended the sit-in. Travel abroad by opposition leaders was again banned. That ban was in effect until yesterday. But it also still remains in effect for dissidents like Kem Sokha.
Under this pressure, opposition leaders last week agreed to attend the opening of Cambodia's new parliament, but have so far held out against joining Hun Sen in a coalition government. But that day will soon come. It will come because, as King Sihanouk recently put it, ''in a Cambodia that is not a state of law and not a full-fledged democracy, I have no other choice than to advise the weak to choose the policy that avoids misfortune for the people, the motherland and themselves.''
Mr. Chairman, many will say that in a Third World country like Cambodia, we cannot expect a better election. Believe me, we can; and IRI has seen them in poor countries like Mongolia and in poor, war-ravaged countries like Nicaragua. There is, in fact, no excuse for such a poor election except the desire of the government in power to stay in power.
Beyond his years with the Khmer Rouge in the 1970's and his authoritarian rule in the 1980's, Hun Sen showed his intention to retain power by rejecting the 1993 election results, by the 1997 coup, and by the 1998 election. As The New York Times put it, ''since the Khmer Rouge came to power in 1975, Cambodia has suffered under an assortment of dreadful governments, and Hun Sen has been in all of them.''
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I would only add that for 20 of the last 23 years, Hun Sen has effectively headed that assortment of dreadful governments.
Mr. Chairman, accepting this election will again consign the people of Cambodia to years of darkness. But accepting this election would have reverberations beyond Cambodia. It would invite other dictators to take a page from Hun Sen's playbook. Dictators around the world will feel free to repress their opposition and the voters for months or years on either side of an election day, confident that the international community would certify the process as long as election day looked good.
Mr. Chairman, in my youth, I wondered if those old phrases describing the United States as ''a beacon of freedom'' or ''a city on a hill'' were just cliches. I have found in my travels around the world that people everywhere do indeed look to us as the bastion of freedom. We should not let them down, and we should not give elections a bad name by assenting to recent events in Cambodia.
Thank you.
Mr. BEREUTER. Thank you very much, Mr. Craner, for your powerful statement.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Craner appears in the appendix.]
Mr. BEREUTER. Next we hear from Mr. Eric C. Bjornlund, Senior Associate and Director of Asia Programs, National Democratic Institute.
Mr. Bjornlund, you may proceed as you wish.
STATEMENT OF ERIC C. BJORNLUND, SENIOR ASSOCIATE AND DIRECTOR OF ASIA PROGRAMS, NATIONAL DEMOCRATIC INSTITUTE
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Mr. BJORNLUND. Mr. Chairman, Members of the Subcommittee, thank you very much for inviting me here today.
I believe that the issues we are discussing are important not only for Cambodia, but because they offer some lessons about evaluating elections all over the world. And these are now issues that are seen in many places. I would like to amplify on some of the points made by my colleagues.
Mr. Chairman, we must remember that no election can be viewed in isolation of the political context in which it takes place, and an election is a process that unfolds over time. We have all been reminding our colleagues in the international community of these points. Now, as we really are coming to the end of what might be called the election process, we can carefully review all phases of that process, and we can see that it has fallen short of democratic norms.
Events since election day are sadly consistent with the violence and institutional flaws that were apparent in the pre-election period, and they suggest that the ruling regime has little interest in power sharing, peaceful governance or human rights.
In my testimony today I would like to make four basic points. First, I want to touch again briefly on the systemic flaws of the pre-election period, because they continue to be important and relevant to our analysis today. Second, I want to explain the institutional failures of the process after election day. Third, I want to remind the Committee of the violence and climate of intimidation that has prevailed since election day; and fourth, I want to comment on the contributions and limitations of national and international observers.
My first point is that while the balloting and initial stages of the vote count went relatively well, the election took place in a highly flawed environment. I believe that you are aware of this, and my colleagues have pointed it out again. In our statement issued by NDI and IRI, which all three of us worked to form, we commented that the voting process was well administered and that the atmosphere on election day was peaceful. We applauded the Cambodian people for turning out in large numbers in the face of serious obstacles.
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At that time, we also reminded people of the serious concerns that we had expressed previously about violence, intimidation, unfair media access and ruling party control of the administrative machinery that had characterized the pre-election period.
It is impossible to measure how or to what extent these flaws may have affected the outcome of the elections. We will just never know. But while the impact of the fundamental flaws in the political environment and the institutional framework may be difficult to measure, they nevertheless affect the integrity and credibility of the overall process.
My second point is that the events since election day mark a reversion to the flaws that were evident before the elections. Regrettably, postelection developments reveal once again the systemic problems that were apparent before the elections.
Since the vote, our pre-election concerns about credibility of bodies responsible for administering the elections and adjudicating disputes have proved well founded. After the election, opposition parties submitted some 800 formal complaints to the national election committee.
They alleged, among other things, problems with the vote count and intimidation of party agents. In response, the NEC made a perfunctory attempt to conduct a recount in just a few locations, but this effort was too limited to yield significant information. Without even a cursory investigation other than this entirely inadequate recount, the NEC summarily dismissed all complaints.
The election commission also refused to provide official rejection notices in accordance with the formal process that had been set up, which jeopardized the parties' ability to take their complaints to the constitutional council. The constitutional council, which is the highest adjudicatory body in Cambodia, has refused to accept the complaints about intimidation of opposition party agents, alleged electoral fraud or the formula by which the seats are allocated. The council's refusal to even consider these complaints, coupled with the election commission's failure to follow due process, has eliminated any meaningful opportunity for appeal.
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The decisionmaking processes of the NEC and the constitutional council also lacked transparency. The NEC, for example, failed to follow its own procedures or to explain its actions when it adopted a new formula for allocating seats in the national assembly. Although the change was made before the election and there is evidence that NEC advisers were merely trying to correct what they believed to be a technical mistake, evidently no one from the opposition parties, domestic monitoring groups, international observer organizations or the diplomatic community was aware that there had been a significant change.
The new formula gave the CPP five additional seats, compared to what it would have received under the previous formula, which was enough to give it a majority in the national assembly.
Our judgment is that the opposition's allegations of fraud in the balloting and counting do not appear to be significant enough in their totality to have affected the overall outcome of the election. But the important point is that the NEC and the constitutional council—because they were not legitimately constituted, have been subject to manipulation and lack credibility in their responses.
In sum, whatever their ultimate merits, the parties' grievances and allegations deserve due process. Because election-related complaints have not been addressed expeditiously, thoroughly and impartially, there can be little public confidence in the integrity of the overall process.
My third point, as my colleagues have pointed out, is that the use of violence and the climate of intimidation continue. The chaos and violence have marred the postelection period. My written statement mentions a number of significant, violent incidents that have occurred in the last 2 months since election day: the detention of Sam Rainsy when he was leading a demonstration, apparent assassination attempts on Hun Sen, a crackdown on demonstrators, killings of a number of people, threats against opposition leaders and a ban on their departure from the country.
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This postelection chaos, initiated by demands for an investigation of election-related complaints, might well have been avoided if there were credible and functioning institutions to administer the grievance process. But the institutional framework for the election has been fatally flawed.
In sum, recent events in Cambodia indicate that the overall process has failed. Unfortunately, the polling and counting days now seem to have been an aberration from Cambodia's unfortunate norm of violence, intimidation and instability.
My final point is just to mention the role of observers. I can briefly mention the national election monitoring groups. They organized very ambitious and effective programs to educate voters, and they were extremely vigilant during the balloting and counting processes. This was an incredible accomplishment, given the obstacles and intimidation that these groups faced.
However, it seemed that many international observers were too willing to lower the bar for Cambodia, too willing to look at Cambodian elections and suggest that it might be unreasonable to expect them to meet international standards.
I would single out challenges faced by observers from overseas governments and intergovernmental organizations. On the one hand, they were in Cambodia to observe and impartially assess the election process. On the other hand, many of them had various diplomatic agendas including sincere but ultimately profoundly mistaken notions about achieving stability in Cambodia. These roles may have been in tension, or even incompatible, which led to statements that were premature and tended to minimize serious problems with the process. Moreover, as Mr. Solarz has pointed out, a number of observers came from undemocratic countries such as Burma, China and Vietnam, and they were allowed an equal voice in the assessment of the election process.
One final point on this: In contrast to many other countries, the United States has played a principled and important role in standing steadfast against a flawed process in Cambodia, first, by not supporting the bodies and machinery created to supervise and administer the elections and, second, by not jumping to embrace the results. This has sent an important signal about not granting legitimacy to a process that has not earned that legitimacy.
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Please permit me to just make three general conclusions. First, the Cambodian elections should be judged against international norms. The process was far from democratic and should not be a model for the future. The relative success of balloting and counting does not excuse or overcome the fundamentally flawed environment in which the election took place. The lack of any meaningful appeals process after election day and renewed intimidation and use of violence have rendered the overall process deficient.
Second, Cambodia needs to create a system of meaningful checks and balances. Cambodian institutions need to be separated from the government and from CPP control. Although U.S. assistance has tried to encourage the development of democratic institutional frameworks and rule of law, the ruling party continues to demonstrate flagrant disregard for principles of due process.
Finally, the United States should work to establish a more cohesive international response to the flawed elections and the climate of impunity that continues to prevail. U.S. leadership made possible the return of opposition leaders to Cambodia, and U.S. leadership is critical now.
The United States and other friends of Cambodia should pressure appropriate authorities to investigate killings and human rights abuses and prosecute those responsible. The United States must be prepared to assist political leaders threatened with politically motivated arrest or prevented from leaving the country. Cambodian nongovernment organizations that have courageously monitored human rights and the political environment should continue to receive our support. The international community should put the onus on the CPP to let go of its stranglehold on power and insist on a coalition that involves genuine power sharing.
Accepting a new government in the name of stability in the absence of a genuinely democratic process or without addressing the climate of impunity can only lead to further instability.
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Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. BEREUTER. Thank you, Mr. Bjornlund, and thanks to all three of you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Bjornlund appears in the appendix.]
Mr. BEREUTER. I would like to begin the questioning under our modified rule.
Mr. Solarz, I did take notes on your two happenings that you thought ought to be in place here and I think those are very excellent suggestions. I would ask you if you think that it was clear given the pre-election environment in which the procedures that existed were so obviously flawed to people in our government, that we should have declared the elections as unacceptable before they took place.
Mr. SOLARZ. It is a tough question, and I guess my answer is no, largely for one reason; and that is that the opposition not only chose to participate in the election, but urged us to send observers in order to maximize the prospects for as honest an election as possible.
If the opposition hadn't asked us to send observers, if the opposition had taken the position that under the circumstances it was simply impossible to have even the hope of a fair election, that the deck was so completely stacked against them that to participate would be to legitimize a charade, I would have been all for supporting their position.
Mr. BEREUTER. That is a position they did not take?
Mr. SOLARZ. That is a position they did not take.
I think they would have been entitled to take that position. On the other hand, I have to respect the judgment they made, because they were in a very difficult situation.
They knew very well they had no military option. Thailand was not about to give them sanctuaries for a new insurgency. The United States was not about to provide them arms. We certainly weren't going to send in the Marines. ASEAN had no taste for a renewal of the conflict. The only real alternative they had to participating in this election, however imperfect it was, was basically a life in exile. And so they chose, under difficult and far from perfect circumstances, to try to make the best of it.
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In order to maximize their prospects, they asked us to come in as observers.
Now, that posed a philosophical conundrum for us. Were we going to take the position, yes, we will go to observe the election, and if the opposition wins—which, by the way, a number of people thought was a real possibility—and in fact they did get 60 percent of the vote, and in fact if the opposition had run united, as many had urged them to do, including your humble servant, they would have had a plurality of the vote, although you still would have had a coalition.
But they chose to participate, and so we were faced with this conundrum. Are we going to take the position that if the opposition wins, it is a fair election; but if it loses, by definition it is unfair? I resolved that dilemma; and I think both my friends here heard me say this in conversations we had with both Prince Ranariddh and Sam Rainsy, the leaders of the opposition, I want you to know we will not hesitate as an observer delegation to denounce this election as totally fraudulent if that is what we find. But if, on the other hand, we find that it appears to be relatively fair in terms of the voting and the counting, we won't hesitate to say so, either.
And this is where Prince Ranariddh chimed in and said, in effect, if there are no more killings between now and the election, if the voting is fair, if the counting is fair, then I will accept the results. I was very encouraged by that response.
Mr. BEREUTER. It was a very generous statement.
Mr. SOLARZ. Extremely. And statesmanlike. Of course, we all know 5 years ago when Ranariddh did win the election, Hun Sen refused to accept the results, and claimed the United Nations stole it.
In fact, I have to tell you, Mr. Chairman, when I went there, I expected one of two things would happen. First, I thought the opposition would win, but like last time, Hun Sen would refuse to accept the results, probably blame Bjornlund and Craner and Solarz for stealing it, and remain in power.
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The other scenario I thought most likely was that by virtue of their lock on the electoral administration, there would be such blatant manipulation on election day or in the counting that it would be clear we were witnessing an electoral charade.
We know from Tammany Hall days in New York, it is not how the votes go in, it is how they come out that counts. So the mere fact that the voting was perfect doesn't mean a damn thing if you have massive manipulations in the counting.
I thought that it was very likely that you would have both. That didn't seem to happen.
What did happen is what I didn't anticipate might happen, which was that the voting would be fairly transparent, the counting would look to be fairly transparent, the opposition, even though it had a majority of the vote nevertheless didn't have a plurality, so Hun Sen's party got a majority of the seats; and then the opposition, in spite of the fact that the indigenous observers didn't see massive fraud, in spite of the fact that the foreign observers didn't see massive fraud, would claim that there had been massive fraud.
Now, I am not prepared, as a philosophical proposition, to say that there wasn't. I don't think there was. I think most of their allegations, if you look at them, probably won't bear scrutiny. But I can't preclude the possibility that they may be on to something, and that is why I think they need to be examined.
Mr. BEREUTER. Thank you, Mr. Solarz.
Mr. Craner, you said in your written statement, to accept this election would in fact devalue the worth of elections in building democracies around the world. I am not sure you said that in your oral statement. I wanted to highlight that.
On the next page, you indicated that the results of the FBI investigation into the Easter 1997 grenade attack on Sam Rainsy should be made public. I gather that is a point which needs to be pursued. You are suggesting to us that it has not been released. Has there been difficulty in getting it released?
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Mr. CRANER. It has not been released in spite of requests.
Mr. BEREUTER. There have been requests?
Mr. CRANER. Yes, from me, among others.
Mr. BEREUTER. Mr. Berman has requested it, I am informed. By the way, Secretary Boyce is here listening to these statements and to the questions, which is I think a very salutary kind of situation that has not always happened.
Mr. Bjornlund, as one of your last points in your written statement, you said the United States should work to establish a more cohesive international response to the flawed elections and climate of impunity that continues to prevail. Would you like to enlarge on that a little bit because this is an area perhaps where you identify some role for Congress—I am not sure—but certainly for the executive branch.
Mr. BJORNLUND. My impression, from our colleagues who continue to be in Cambodia and have been continuously for a number of months, is that there is a real sense of division among the international community. There is a sense that Hun Sen has skillfully played off divisions within the international community and different emphases from different countries, particularly donor countries.
I think in that context it is important that the United States continue to stand firm on the principles of democracy in Cambodia. I think our main interest in Cambodia is to try to encourage stability, which will only come out of genuine institutions, genuine democracy, and only that will lead to economic and social development in Cambodia.
Our impression is that the more that the United States tries to push those principles with its allies and others involved in Cambodia, the more likely that the pressure will work and that there will be a good response in Cambodia.
Mr. BEREUTER. Thank you. I am under the 8-minute rule here. Perhaps one more question and that is to Mr. Solarz.
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What role, if any, can King Sihanouk play in this post-election environment?
Mr. SOLARZ. Potentially, I think he has a significant role to play in his capacity as sort of father of the nation. To some extent, he has tried to play that role by bringing the leaders of the different parties into his presence in order to encourage some kind of understanding between them.
He clearly is not going to involve himself in the business of negotiating a new government. I think he will limit himself to appeals to the goodwill and to the sense of patriotism of the parties involved. He can certainly be helpful in blessing any understanding that may emerge, if one does, thereby giving it an incremental measure of legitimacy it otherwise might not have.
But we need to remember, Mr. Chairman, that he, in effect, is a constitutional monarch; he is not an absolute ruler. And so his ability to shape and direct events is very limited although not inconsiderable.
Mr. BEREUTER. Thank you.
I turn now to our distinguished colleague from California, Mrs. Capps.
Mrs. CAPPS. Thank you.
Mr. Solarz, it is a pleasure to hear you and Mr. Craner, and Mr. Bjornlund as well. I guess I am concerned about the title of this hearing this afternoon, ''Where Do We Go From Here,'' and the relationship that you three in your agencies and who you represent and your long history in Cambodia, and I guess also the other observers who have been there.
By being there for the process, is there a tainting almost? Can you really observe it and be critical of it at the same time we want to foster and nourish the democracy that does exist there?
And so I guess I am interested in the role that you see yourself playing now at this particular date, how much to pursue the wrongdoing over the past several weeks, how much to focus on the future.
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Mr. SOLARZ. My colleagues, of course, will speak for themselves. Each of them represents an institution.
I represent only myself. My job is simply to speak truth to power. I have no institutional interest to represent or defend. We have never met before although, as you know, we have a close connection.
Mrs. CAPPS. Yes, we do.
Mr. SOLARZ. You have, I gather, benefited from the same dedicated and effective work that I was the beneficiary of, in the form of Jeremy Rabinovitz.
But you may not perhaps know that my own relationship to Cambodia goes back over 20 years. I was deeply involved in the effort to protest the abuses of the Pol Pot regime, to encourage resistance to the depredations of the Hun Sen regime, on which I worked closely with some of your colleagues on the Committee, who were then my colleagues.
After the coup last July, I was asked by the Administration to go out as a special envoy, and I know that both the IRI and NDI will tell you that I strongly encouraged them to support the exiled politicians who had been driven out of the country, so a hope of democracy could be maintained.
My preferences were clearly well known. I would have infinitely preferred a victory for the opposition. But I also feel that I have an obligation to report to people what I saw, and in a very complex, nuanced situation, to describe it in its totality, even if what I find doesn't necessarily comport with what I would have preferred.
That doesn't necessarily make me right, it doesn't necessarily make me courageous, but I would like to feel I have a certain amount of intellectual integrity, and I would be unfaithful to you and to myself if I said what I thought people might prefer to hear rather than what I really believe.
Let me just make one parenthetical observation. My good friend Lorne over here held up the two voter registration cards which were given to Sichan Siv, a survivor of the Cambodian holocaust, who came to the United States at the age of 13, and in one of the truly great American success stories, ended up working on the White House staff of George Bush, and is now an American citizen.
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I suppose the implication was that if an American citizen could get a Cambodian registration card, it ipso facto suggests that there was something to be desired in the registration procedures.
I remember one day when I was a Congressman, a Pakistani in my district came to see me to ask me to expedite his application for citizenship. I asked him how long he had been here. He said, well, I have been here 4 years. I said, I would love to help you, sir, but in order to be a citizen, you have to be here for 5 years. He said, yes, but I voted in the last Presidential election, so I should get my citizenship now.
My only point is that these kinds of things happen even in the most advanced democracies. For all I know, maybe there were tens of thousands of people who were registered illegally to vote in the election. But the mere fact that somebody got a registration card who shouldn't have gotten one no more proves the election was illegitimate than the fact that my Pakistani constituent voted in the 1992 Presidential elections—I didn't ask him who he voted for, by the way—might call into question the legitimacy of that election.
Mr. CRANER. I would agree with you. That alone would not call into question the legitimacy of the election in Cambodia any more than it does here. But I would point out the context that there are some other differences between elections in Cambodia and the United States.
Bob Dole did not have trouble getting on TV like Rainsy and Ranariddh did. Bob Dole's people were not threatened with death or actually killed like Ranariddh's and Rainsy's people were. So this registration issue alone certainly doesn't prove anything; but in context, I think it does raise serious questions.
Let me go back to your previous question, which was the issue for us, how do we work there and then judge the election? I would give you two answers.
Again, a little personal history. I have worked for Senator McCain here and in the Senate. He is highly interested in Asia, as you know. I worked in the Bush Administration State Department and NSC, doing Asia, came to IRI just as they were beginning their Cambodia program, so there is a deep personal interest.
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But the real answer to the question I would give you as an institution is, I have talked to the head of NDI and he agrees with this—the one thing, the only thing we bring to elections is integrity. We have to have integrity.
Speaking for IRI, we have condemned elections before and been criticized for it. When we condemned the election in Haiti in 1995, we were criticized by many on the Democratic side of the aisle. When, a year later, we condemned the election in Albania, I got calls from many of my compatriots in the Republican Party for whom Mr. Berisha has been a very, very good friend, saying, how could you do that? My answer to them was the answer I just gave to you: All I have got is my integrity, and I can't whitewash what I see; I have got to call it like I see it.
Mr. BJORNLUND. In my written statement, I touched on the importance of distinguishing among observers and some of the particular difficulties that intergovernmental organizations and representatives of governments face in trying to assess the genuineness of elections, because often their agendas are much broader than promoting democracy. This is not to say their other agendas are not important and valuable ones; they typically are, but they are much broader. This is why we feel it has been very valuable that the United States has set up these institutes with some independence that can focus just on promoting democracy.
I think we have a real advantage because of our work all over the world over the last 15 years. Given that, we can just focus on what we think about the elections. I think that that has been enormously valuable to us.
We have remained very engaged in Cambodia for a period of time, and we expect to remain so in the future with nongovernmental organizations and Cambodian democrats more generally trying to encourage the process itself rather than seeking to help one side or another, to promote one outcome or one particular group of leaders to come to government in Cambodia. I think that that integrity is pretty apparent to everybody who is familiar with our work.
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Mrs. CAPPS. I guess, then, I would finish by saying, I am heartened by that long-term involvement because that is one of the major goals for the future, I am sure, for the country is that you are credible, very credible people and institutions there. That speaks well for us all.
Thank you.
Mr. BEREUTER. Thank you.
The gentleman from California, Mr. Rohrabacher, is recognized.
Mr. ROHRABACHER. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Just so I won't be left out of gushing over Stephen Solarz here, let me note when I first came to Congress 10 years ago, Steve was one of the Members that I respected most. There is a certain level of bipartisanship, and Steve took his job seriously when he was chairman of this Subcommittee.
I would see him on trips sometimes, and I will never forget, I might get caught watching the movie on the airplane, but Stephen Solarz was there studying the whole time on the airplane on these long airplane flights and shows you one level of seriousness. He has lost weight, he looks better now that he has gotten out of Congress and everything like that, but he was actually very——
Mr. BEREUTER. A healthier, wealthier, lesser Steve.
[Laughter.]
Mr. ROHRABACHER. When Steve was a Member, and we are delighted, Steve, that you are still staying active, very delighted that you are staying active.
But second of all, let me say a little bit about our Republican and Democrat institutes here. I am very proud of both of you. I know that the other Members of Congress look at the job that you are doing, and we are just in awe of the job that you guys are doing. You represent the best in America.
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I will take a little bit of credit here. Ronald Reagan did get together with a Democrat Congress in what was another bipartisan effort back in the 1980's to establish the National Endowment for Democracy. He did it—I remember the speech when he presented this idea in front of the world—it was at the British parliament speech.
I just think that this is what I would prefer—you guys are worth I don't know how many aircraft carriers or what, but as long as we are on the side of people in the world who want democracy and believe in individual rights and respect and dignity for the rights of everyone, these—just the fact that we have put that emphasis, I think gives our country such leverage; and the fact that we can do it both as Republicans and Democrats speaks well of us. I am just proud of both of you and the job you did in Cambodia.
That is the gushy part. Now here is, for some of the tough part here, about the election here.
Mr. Solarz, my reading of the outcome of the election was not that massive voter fraud was needed to change the outcome of this election. It appears that FUNCINPEC got 32 percent of the vote and the CPP got 41 percent of the vote. To my way of thinking, that shows that if it was just a 5-percent fraud factor and a shift, that changed the outcome of the entire election.
Now, here is the election—for all three of you—from what you saw in this election, could there have been a 5-percent shift in the vote because of either fraud or some of the other things we are talking about?
Mr. CRANER. I think that is the point we are all making. We don't know the answer. It doesn't look like we are going to get an answer because the NEC and the constitutional court have declined to hear any of the complaints.
It is worth noting that because of the organization of this election, it would not be very difficult at all to have a five-point difference, because it is a province-by-province election. So you wouldn't have to do much in every province to get——
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Mr. ROHRABACHER. For example, if just the areas that were being observed by China, Burma and Vietnam had a certain amount of election fraud, would that not have added up to about 5-percent fraud for the election?
Steve.
Mr. SOLARZ. The number of polling places observed by foreign observers, let alone by the three from the countries you mentioned, were infinitesimal compared to the number observed by Cambodian observers themselves.
But the answer to your question is, of course, we don't know. No one will ever know.
Keep in mind it is also possible that the efforts at intimidation could have backfired in the sense that it would not surprise me to find out that there were some who voted against the ruling party because they resented the intimidation. One thing I think all of us would agree, it was fairly clear when you went into these polling places that the balloting was secret. I mean, people were behind a cardboard box. No one was watching them or really could watch them. I am sure there are some people who voted for the ruling party, even though their vote was secret, because they were afraid that somehow it would not be secret or would become known. The bottom line is that we will never know the answer to that question. But if you said to me, did the pre-election intimidation put a big cloud over this election? Absolutely, yes, it did.
On the other hand, I come back to what Ranariddh said to us, that in spite of the intimidation, in spite of the exclusion from the electronic media, he was able to campaign and he felt that if the voting and the counting were transparent and he didn't win, he would accept the result.
Mr. ROHRABACHER. As if the counting was transparent.
Mr. SOLARZ. Which is critical. It doesn't do any good to have transparent voting if you don't have transparent counting. It is how the votes come out ultimately that counts. But I would say to you, Mr. Rohrabacher, that the mere fact that the opposition alleges fraud in the counting doesn't necessarily mean that it took place.
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Furthermore, it may well be that there was fraud in some of the counting. Personally, I would be surprised if there was not. But then the question becomes, was the fraud of such a magnitude that it could have changed the result in the constituencies where the fraud took place? In other words, you may throw out all the ballots in one ballot box and substitute ballots marked for the CPP. That may take a thousand votes away from FUNCINPEC and add a thousand votes to the CPP. But if the CPP won the seat by 7,000 votes, that one instance of fraud would not have changed anything.
So you need answers to all of these questions. But I certainly agree with you that it is conceivable that the preballot intimidation could have influenced more than 5 percent. I am not sure though what conclusion you draw from that in terms of where we go from here and where they go from here.
Mr. BJORNLUND. If I could offer a brief comment. I think it is important to distinguish two different kinds of flaws in the process. One flaw is the possibility of fraud in the balloting and counting. I agree that we can never know the effect of balloting and counting fraud in these elections. I don't think we will ever know because there will not be a serious investigation about the extent of that kind of fraud, and therefore, it is very hard for us to make absolute judgments about its magnitude and its effect.
However, I disagree with my colleague, Mr. Craner, a bit and would say that I would speculate that we have not seen sufficient evidence to guess that that kind of fraud would be enough to have changed which party would have won the plurality. Even the allegations taken as true do not add up to a significant change in the results of the election and probably to many, if any, seats.
With respect to the other kinds of flaws, the environment in which the election took place, including the intimidation, both before the election and after the election, I think those are very, very serious. And, again, we cannot know the impact of those flaws. But it certainly is not unreasonable to think that large numbers of people could have been intimidated or might not have cast ballots the way they would have in the absence of that intimidation. And the important point is that the integrity of the process was compromised by those flaws.
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Mr. SOLARZ. Mr. Rohrabacher, can I make one brief point here?
You may remember one of the things I used to try to do when I was sitting where you are sitting was, wherever possible, to search for consensus on a bipartisan basis. And I wonder if a consensus might not exist among all of us in the sense that I think we all agree that, taken as a totality, the results are not acceptable as of the moment.
On the other hand, I suspect that if, despite Mr. Bjornlund's expectation that there will not be a fair process for adjudicating the process, if such a process were established, and they looked through these 800 complaints and came to the conclusion that most of them had no merit, and the few that did would not have changed the results of the election; and if the opposition then accepted that process and said, OK, our complaints have been heard, and even though we find the election as a whole wanting—there was intimidation and so on—nevertheless, we are prepared to accept the results and move on, we think this did constitute an expression of the will of the people and we are prepared to take our seats in parliament and, some of us, to go into a government, and we urge the international community to accept this new government, I suspect we would all say that we ought to accept that new government—work to make it better, work to make sure these abuses do not happen in the future, but I doubt we would take the position that we would be more Catholic than the Pope and rejected.
Mr. ROHRABACHER. Let me give you the big ''but'' that comes on.
But, in that situation, yes, that would be fine, except that would also assume that Hun Sen is not picking up his enemies and murdering them after that point. And there is very much evidence at this time that Mr. Hun Sen, because of his own personal background or his values whatever it is, he is a bad guy who, if people speak up against him, he is going to murder his opponents.
To back that up, I am going to ask permission from the chairman to do something different here in one moment, but first let me say that having deeply been—been deeply involved in this process from the beginning, I was speaking to Ranariddh and Sam Rainsy's wife; both of these people expressed to me that they didn't want to have the elections at this time, they would have preferred to have had the elections put off for a few months, and that there was pressure that was put onto them by various outside groups and governments, et cetera, ASEAN and others, to have the elections done and get this over with.
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It seems to me that was a mistake for us to do that. And I don't think—and I think that those individuals were pressured to do something they didn't want to do. And what I would like to ask now, with the indulgence of the Chair, and we have with us a Buddhist monk who has recently escaped from Cambodia, or got out of Cambodia, who may know about—be able to tell us at least for 1 minute about whether or not people are now, after the election, turning up missing. And whether or not the election ended this or whether or not this type of gangsterism continues in Cambodia.
And with your permission, could we have——
Mr. BEREUTER. Would you ask unanimous consent for that purpose?
Mr. ROHRABACHER. I would ask unanimous consent that Rithipol, a Buddhist monk from Cambodia, be permitted to address us for 2 minutes. And perhaps could enlighten us as to what the situation now is in terms of the safety of people in Cambodia.
Mr. BEREUTER. Did you intend that the panel be here during this?
Mr. ROHRABACHER. Yes.
Mr. BEREUTER. If the gentleman wishes to testify for 2 minutes, he is welcome to come to the table.
Mr. RITHIPOL. Thank you very much Mr. Chairman and Mr. Rohrabacher. I am very grateful to be given this opportunity, sir.
I am a U.S. citizen. Was born in Cambodia, and now I am trying to finish my degree at Brandeis University on the research of Buddhism and social welfare in Cambodia. I went to Cambodia in early July to do my research and to hope to help promote peace in my motherland. But unfortunately, I was—my hope was shattered by this recent violence crackdown, and I was put on the blacklist, and with the help of the U.N. Human Rights Center and the U.S. embassy, I escaped to Thailand and be here today.
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Let me tell you, sir, that what I have seen in the past few weeks in Cambodia was the first time in history that Cambodian people rose up and expressed the power of the people to deny the dictator, meaning Mr. Hun Sen. The people did not participate much in the campaign of the political parties or anything like that, but they expressed the will. They said they had enough with the practice of Mr. Hun Sen, who resorted to violence all the time.
And then last, he ordered troops to beat up and kill Buddhist monks, which represent Buddhism, the state religion of Cambodia. And our question is, if someone like that who has no respect for Buddhism, the state religion of Cambodia, will he be able to be again the new Prime Minister? And the answer for all of us Cambodian people and Buddhist community, we rose up and expressed our wish saying, no, to this kind of murderous and violent leader.
So, we say to ourselves that last time we did not know about Pol Pot's intention to our country, and this time we know about Hun Sen's; and last time the United States did not act early enough or in time to stop Pol Pot and this time they have the opportunity to help Cambodian people to stop Hun Sen to be the second Pol Pot for us Cambodian people.
Thank you very much.
Mr. BEREUTER. Thank you very much.
Mr. Rohrabacher, do you have any concluding statement?
Mr. ROHRABACHER. I am very proud of these two guys. I am very proud to know you too, Steve, and that you are staying active, very grateful to you. And the Cambodian people, I hope they get the word from this hearing, there is a consensus among Americans, Republicans and Democrats alike. We are not going to see Cambodia slip back into the era of a Pol Pot, whether Hun Sen is in charge or whoever is in charge. We are for the people of Cambodia who want to have democracy and peace and stability and prosperity and human dignity, and we are watching very closely right now. Congress is watching very closely and that is what this hearing is all about.
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Thank you very much.
Mr. BEREUTER. I join my colleague in that statement, and I want to thank our witnesses for their time today, for their excellent testimony, and for their help to us.
Thank you. The Subcommittee stands adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 3:45 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]
A P P E N D I X
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