Sihanouk received credit for achieving his country's independence, and this greatly enhanced his prestige. Among the peasants he was widely seen as heir to Cambodia's ancient tradition of "god-kings." Sihanouk was also a charming and charismatic, if often eccentric, man who visited the common people
(Nov. 30) National assembly approves formation of coalition government with Hun Sen as prime minister, after electing Prince Norodom Ranariddh president of Cambodia.
1998
1998 (Dec. 5) Last active Khmer Rouge guerrillas surrender to government.
1999 (Mar.) Khmer Rouge commander Ta Mok, known as "the Butcher," captured by soldiers of the Cambodian government.
1999 (May) Cambodian soldiers capture the former head of the Khmer Rouge
Prison at Tuol Sleng, where as many as 14,000 people were tortured and killed.
1999 (May) Cambodia joins the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
2000 (Nov.) Chinese president Jiang Zemin visits Cambodia, causing the Cambodian government to delay procedures for trials of Khmer Rouge leaders, former allies of China.
2001 (Aug.) Sihanouk signs a law making it possible to bring Khmer Rouge leaders to trial.
2002 (Feb.) Frustrated by lack of progress, the United Nations ends its talks with the Cambodian government about bringing Khmer Rouge leaders to trial.
2002 (Sept.) United Nations suggests it will reopen discussions of Khmer Rouge trials
With the Cambodian government.
2002 (Sept. 7) Former Khmer Rouge colonel Chhouk Rin is convicted of the murder of
Three Western backpackers in 1994.
In their villages and identified himself as their father.
The political party Sihanouk founded and led, the Sangkum Reastr Niyum (the Popular Socialist Community), declared the protection of Buddhism as one of its central tenets, strengthening a traditional tie between the monarchy and the national religion. Thus, in addition to pro-Vietnamese and anti-Vietnamese leftists and noncommunist nationalists, Cambodia also had a royalist faction.
In international politics, Sihanouk became one of the leaders of the nonaligned movement of nations that attempted to take a neutral position in the Cold War between the West and the communist countries. He also tried to maintain friendly relations with North Vietnam, which he correctly believed would eventually win the war against South Vietnam. These positions made him distrusted by South Vietnam's protector, the United States.
At the same time, however, the poverty of Cambodia made it necessary for Sihanouk to take aid wherever he could get it, and the United States became the main source of military aid and military training for the Royal Khmer Armed Forces. In this way, a pro-American faction developed in the upper ranks of the Cambodian military.
For a time, Sihanouk managed to include the leftists in his government. However, he also saw them as threats and occasionally cracked down on them, driving the new general secretary of Cambodia's Communist Party, Pol Pot, into the jungle in the early 1960's.
By 1967 the leftists and Sihanouk had parted ways and the Kampuchean Communist Party, labeled the "Khmer Rouge" by the French-speaking Sihanouk, had taken up arms against Sihanouk in the countryside. Cambodian society and economy, moreover, became increasingly unstable, creating a dangerous environment for the country's factionalized political system.
World History
