Becker, Dudman & Caldwell interview Khmer Rouge Foreign Minister IENG Sary at Chamcar Mon Palace in PhnomPenh. When pressed on human rights in Cambodia he said “killings could not be avoided after the liberation” but the problem was solved with a “good solution”: https://t.co/cEhjZb6nct

The Khmer Rouge asses the ongoing visit of Western Journalists to Cambodia and complain “Specially, the woman, Elizabeth Becker, just keeps collecting information and spotting our weak points.” https://t.co/E0nwXCA6PB

@AFP reports that the Vietnamese army are now less than 50km south of PhnomPenh and controls two-thirds of the provinces of Stung Treng, Ratanakiri, Mondolkiri, Kompong Cham, Prey Vieng, Svay Rieng, Kandal and Takeo. It also advanced towards Kratie.

Speaking in Japan, 🇻🇳Foreign Minister TRINH says Vietnam supports the Anti-Pol Pot United Front because they would set the border dispute peacefully – contrary to Pol Pot, who the Chinese encouraged to settle it by force, sending weapons and advisors. @VDacicus The Documentation Center of Cambodia, lists him as an survivor who were alive after 1979 but disappeared since https://t.co/26vGGyGeky @vze26m98 You’re right, that’s Prasith.

SPK (radio of the Kampuchean National United Front for National Salvation) broadcasts that in several Cambodian villages, the people marched to the seats of the local reactionary administration to struggle and to punish their Khmer Rouge torturers. https://t.co/I0Wvjfsa90 Visiting Angkor Wat, Becker notes that “there has been no major damage” but the temples suffer, like the National Museum in PhnomPenh, from a “lack of care” & were “left to deteriorate”. However, they are “protected politically” as a symbol of the revolution: https://t.co/p3fDE2tntO

At Phum Preah Meas cooperative, Becker & Dudman ask to be able to speak to someone who lived in PhnomPenh before the evacuation https://t.co/REhMgNKeaf

Heading up the Mekong by boat towards Kompong Cham, Becker & co are accompanied by Ok Sakun, who was thought dead – for their guide this is proof of anti-Khmer Rouge propaganda. Becker notes that Ok resembled a ghost & later believes he was freed from a labor camp: https://t.co/HgwxSxk0vR “In a show of confidence, our Khmer Rouge escorts took us to Krek”, which Western Intelligence considered to be in Vietnamese hands. In two areas, where Radio Hanoi spoke of uprisings, we found peacefull harvest scenes, clearly in control of🇰🇭, writes Dudman. https://t.co/DPXw9AcrEO

On the boat journey to Kompong Cham, @Elizbeckerwrite writes that like in PhnomPenh, sign of ordinary life are missing. The only time she saw children playing in the water, she thought the scene staged: https://t.co/xAG9t8buIV At S-21, Australian Yachtsmen R. Dean and D. Scott name Mr. Magoo, astronaut John Glen & tennis player Chuck McKinley as their CIA agents. One of them was burned alive by Khmer Rouge guards, who ignited a petrol-filled tire around his neck. https://t.co/V7AjlsF2Hk

In an interview with NCNA (Chinese news agency), Pol Pot says he is prepared “to fight a protracted war” with Vietnam. Contrary to Vietnam, Cambodia is “fundamentally marked by stability” and 🇰🇭is better than Vietnam “as far as food supply is concerned”. https://t.co/h70FfcLZKs Becker, Dudman & Caldwell are taken to a Fishing cooperative on the Tonle Sap, the former military headquarters of Lon Nol, & the Institute for Scientific Training & Information, where they saw 7-year-olds repairing engines, “what clearly amounted to child labor”.

Getting to see mainly touristic attractions in PhnomPenh, Becker notes what she hasn’t seen: “So far we had heard no children, seen nothing but young cadre & workers. There were no foodstalls, no families, no young people playing sports, no one out on a walk” A recent 🇻🇳military advance toward Kratie suggests that Vietnam may add to the Salvation Front’s attributes a counter-government, established in an enlarged “liberated zone”. It could also serve to mask bigger 🇻🇳 military designs in Cambodian colors, says @nytimes Thiounn Prasith, a Khmer Rouge Foreign Affairs official, who often went with IENG Sary to the @UN in New York, is assigned to take care of…