anlong veng – As the government flag fluttered over this longtime Khmer Rouge stronghold Monday, soldiers milled about the veranda of rebel leader Ta Mok’s house and looked north toward the mountainous border where remaining hard-liners are believed to be sheltering.
“Right now, all Ta Mok’s forces have run away to stay in the Dangrek Mountains,” former Khmer Rouge commander Yim Pin said, pointing across the swampland that separates Anlong Veng village from the border region.
“The Khmer Rouge, including Ta Mok, are holding a defensive position there. They are not fighting because they don’t have many troops left,” Yim Pin said.
RCAF Deputy Chief of General Staff Meas Sophea identified the region occupied by the remaining hard-liners as “mountain 200,” a small hilly area about 3 km south of the Thai border. He claimed Ta Mok has only 200 loyal fighters at the fortified bastion.
Fighting alongside new defectors, RCAF forces hope to take the area next week, Meas Sophea told reporters at a military camp just outside central Anlong Veng. Government troops were firing Monday toward the position from tanks 1 km north of the fallen stronghold “in order to scare the Khmer Rouge away,” he said.
But locating the rebel leader Ta Mok, and the other remaining hard-liners, including the notorious architect of disastrous Khmer Rouge policies, Pol Pot, may be more difficult, he acknowledged. “I believe Ta Mok and Pol Pot and the other leaders are all together in Thai territory,” Meas Sophea said, adding that “people” who had crossed the Thai border from Ban Sangum, 3 km inside Thailand, had said the leaders were there.
“I’m not sure of the situation. We are trying to contact the
Khmer Rouge divisions with him,” he said, fueling speculation the hard-line leadership may have been detained by their own forces who turned against them.
Meas Sophea said he did not think Thai military were holding the leaders, as some reports have suggested, but urged the Thais to do what they could to apprehend the group.
Thai officials previously said there had been no arrests of any Khmer Rouge leaders in Thailand and insisted Monday to Agence France-Presse that most of the area still is controlled by hard-liners. Khmer Rouge radio continued broadcasting, even with a Khmer New Year message.
A Thai Embassy official in Phnom Penh said Monday that he had no news on the situation.
But Anlong Veng itself looked to be under secure government control Monday.
Fighting between rebel and government troops, as well as mass defections to the government side, have forced thousands to seek shelter in a half-dozen camps located around the former rebel area, leaving the town empty of all but the occupying forces. RCAF officials claim the number of defections, including family members, is 20,000, but the figure couldn’t be confirmed.
Chinese-donated army trucks all morning bumped along the dusty laterite road running through a sprawl of shacks that makes up the rebel stronghold.
Above the unfinished three-story hospital, one of the few concrete structures in town, a government flag has flown since troops raised it Friday after more than two weeks of fighting, highlighted by conflicting reports over territorial gains. “We don’t talk about Anlong Veng anymore because we control it. Now we only talk about mountain 200,” Meas Sophea said.
Military officials and defectors estimated Sunday that about two-thirds of the people formerly living under Ta Mok’s control have now defected to the government side. Analysts estimated the population of Anlong Veng area before the insurrection last month at between 40,000 and 50,000.
“The Khmer Rouge and the government sleep together, eat together, dance together,” one RCAF official said as the former enemies mingled in the camp just outside of Anlong Veng village.
Military officials say their plan is to move the defectors back into the area as soon as they are convinced it is safe. Defector Yim Pin said he supports this idea, but cautioned against moving back too soon. “Right now, it is not safe, because the Khmer Rouge are too close,” he said.
“But I feel in the future it will be safe. Now we cooperate with the government army to take back all the people to stay in Anlong Veng, the same as Pailin,” he said, referring to the defector zone controlled by former Khmer Rouge deputy premier Ieng Sary and military commander Y Chhien.
