Yasushi Akashi, former chief of Untac, the man given the responsibility of re-organizing Cambodia from 1991 to 1993, made a low-key entrance into Phnom Penh on Sunday night, eight years after he departed following the nation’s 1993 elections.
Akashi, who in his present role as chairman of the Japan Center for Preventive Diplomacy will participate in a small-arms destruction ceremony today in Kompong Chhnang province, walked through the regular passenger terminal at Pochentong airport and was greeted by a representative of the Japanese embassy.
There was no government reception awaiting him, but during his three-day visit, Akashi will meet with King Norodom Sihanouk, Prime Minister Hun Sen, National Assembly president Prince Norodom Ranariddh, and other officials.
“I think in the last eight years since Untac was here Cambodia has made considerable progress,” he said on arrival. “Democracy is being established here. It’s more firmly established than in our days.”
Untac came in after the October 1991 Paris Peace Accords were signed. The Untac mission was at the time the largest UN intervention in history, totaling some $2 billion. Their work here has since become the model for other such intervention, including East Timor.
Some Cambodian leaders have been critical of Untac, saying that they did not include ordinary Cambodians in their projects, exceeded their mandate, and let factional bickering spin out of control.
And although the UN sponsored Cambodia’s first democratic elections in 1993 and hailed the vote as a success, others argue that the elections were a failure because the results could not be implemented. Although the Funcinpec party won the majority vote, a power sharing deal had to be established between the royalists and the CPP to prevent more fighting.
In response to past criticisms of the elections from Prime Minister Hun Sen, Akashi said, “I can understand the disappointment of Mr Hun Sen because his People’s Party lost elections at that time to Funcinpec, but so far as Untac election procedures were concerned I think it was a very sound, solid preparations that we made. So we had a few points of disagreement but, by and large, I think we worked together very well indeed. And I appreciated his spirit of compromise and flexibility.”
During their meeting on Tuesday afternoon, Akashi said he will ask Hun Sen about the relationship between Cambodia and the UN, including the prime minister’s plans for the creation of the Khmer Rouge tribunal.
Others, especially Hun Sen, have claimed that Untac officials and peace keepers contributed to the spread of crime, especially prostitution and vice, and the HIV/AIDS epidemic
When asked what the Untac mission had given Cambodia, Hun Sen once replied, “AIDS.”
Although figures on Cambodia’s HIV rate before the 1990s are not available, the country has since become one of the countries most affected by the virus. Cambodia’s infection rate is the highest in the world outside of sub-Saharan Africa.
But to dwell on such attacks is to miss the larger point, the Khmer Institute of Democracy’s Lao Mong Hay said Sunday.
“I don’t share that view. We had undergone oppressive regimes for centuries. Cambodian society has changed dramatically from a closed police state to an open and free society,” thanks to Untac’s efforts, said Lao Mong Hay, who worked with Untac and has written a book titled “UNfinished Business.”
If Untac was unable to complete the transition to a healthy democracy—and “there are still remnants of the police state,” Lao Mong Hay said—it is because of the government’s own corruption.
“For myself, I blame Cambodia’s leaders. [Untac] put an end to the war, but it could not complete its job,” Lao Mong Hay said.
Although there has been instability since the Untac mission, the mission nonetheless ended a fratricidal and suicidal war, he said.
“Without Untac, you and I wouldn’t be here talking about this,” he said. “Without Untac, we would have been fighting to the last Cambodian.”
Opposition leader Sam Rainsy said any progress achieved in Cambodia over the last 10 years would not have been possible without Akashi’s work and said the UN special representative would always be remembered by Cambodians as the one who planted the “vital seeds of democracy.”
