War In Cambodia From 1970s To 1979 . Pol Pot Regime

Part One  about Cambodia 

The Khmer Rouge period (1975–1979) refers to the rule of Pol Pot, Nuon Chea, Ieng Sary, Son Sen, Khieu Samphan and the Communist Party of Kampuchea over Cambodia, which the Khmer Rouge renamed as Democratic Kampuchea.

The four-year period cost approximately 2 million lives through the combined result of political executions, disease, starvation, and forced labor.^[1][2][3][4] Due to the large numbers, the deaths during the rule of the Khmer Rouge are commonly known as the Cambodian Holocaust or Cambodian genocide. The Khmer Rouge took power at the end of the Cambodian Civil War and were only toppled after the invasion of Cambodia by the neighbouring Socialist Republic of Vietnam in the Cambodian–Vietnamese War. Most of Cambodia remained under Vietnamese occupation for over a decade.

Politics

By the April 1975 communist victory, Pol Pot and his associates occupied the most important positions in the Communist Party of Kampuchea (CPK) and in the state hierarchies. Pol Pot was known as "Vach du Mach" or One with the Gun. He had been CPK general secretary since February 1963. His associates functioned as the party's Political Bureau, and they held a majority of the seats on the Central Committee.

Through the 1970s, and especially after mid-1975, the party was shaken by factional struggles. There were even armed attempts to topple Pol Pot. The resultant punitive measures were taken in 1977 and 1978 when hundreds of thousands of people, including some of the most important CPK leaders, were executed.

Establishing the Constitution of Democratic Kampuchea

The communists abolished the Royal Government of National Union of Kampuchea (established in 1970). Cambodia did not have any sort of government until the proclamation of the Constitution of Democratic Kampuchea on January 5, 1976

The communists continued to use King Norodom Sihanouk as a figurehead for the government until April 2, 1976, when Sihanouk resigned as head of state. Sihanouk remained under insecure house arrest in Phnom Penh, until late in the war with Vietnam when he departed for the United States where he made Democratic Kampuchea's case before the Security Council. He eventually relocated to China.

The "rights and duties of the individual" were briefly defined in Article 12. They included none of what are commonly regarded as guarantees of political human rights^{[citation needed]} except the statement that "men and women are equal in every respect." The document declared, however, that "all workers" and "all peasants" were "masters" of their factories and fields. An assertion that "there is absolutely no unemployment in Democratic Kampuchea" rings true in light of the regime's massive use of force.

The Constitution defined Democratic Kampuchea's foreign policy principles in Article 21, the document's longest, in terms of "independence, peace, neutrality, and nonalignment." It pledged the country's support to anti-imperialiststruggles in the Third World. In light of the regime's aggressive attacks against Vietnamese, Thai, and Lao territory during 1977 and 1978, the promise to "maintain close and friendly relations with all countries sharing a common border" bore little resemblance to reality.

Governmental institutions were outlined very briefly in the Constitution. The legislature, the Kampuchean People's Representative Assembly (KPRA), contained 250 members "representing workers, peasants, and other working people and the Kampuchean Revolutionary army." One hundred and fifty KPRA seats were allocated for peasant representatives; fifty, for the armed forces; and fifty, for worker and other representatives. The legislature was to be popularly elected for a five-year term. Its first and only election was held on March 20, 1976. "New people" apparently were not allowed to participate.

The executive branch of government also was chosen by the KPRA. It consisted of a state presidium "responsible for representing the state of Democratic Kampuchea inside and outside the country." It served for a five-year term, and its president was head of state. Khieu Samphan was the only person to serve in this office, which he assumed after Sihanouk's resignation. The judicial system was composed of "people's courts," the judges for which were appointed by the KPRA, as was the executive branch.

The Constitution did not mention regional or local government institutions. After assuming power, the Khmer Rouge abolished the old provinces (khet) and replaced them with seven zones; the Northern Zone, Northeastern Zone, Northwestern Zone, Central Zone, Eastern Zone, Western Zone, and Southwestern Zone. There were also two other regional-level units: the Kracheh Special Region Number 505 and, until 1977, the Siemreab Special Region Number 106.

The zones were divided into damban (regions) that were given numbers. Number One, appropriately, encompassed the Samlot region of the Northwestern Zone (including Battambang Province), where the insurrection against Sihanouk had erupted in early 1967. With this exception, the damban appear to have been numbered arbitrarily.

The damban were divided into srok (districts), khum (subdistricts), and phum (villages), the latter usually containing several hundred people. This pattern was roughly similar to that which existed under Sihanouk and the Khmer Republic, but inhabitants of the villages were organized into krom (groups) composed of ten to fifteen families. On each level, administration was directed by a three-person committee (kanak, or kena).

CPK members occupied committee posts at the higher levels. Subdistrict and village committees were often staffed by local poor peasants, and, very rarely, by "new people." Cooperatives (sahakor), similar in jurisdictional area to the khum, assumed local government responsibilities in some areas.

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