Khmer Rouge Leader Apologizes in LetterFormer Khmer Rouge prime minister Khieu Samphan strongly denied yesterday that he contributed to the deaths of 1.7 million people during Pol Pot's reign of terror in Cambodia in the late 1970s.Yet in an open letter, he offered a rare apology for the mass killings and atrocities during the Khmer Rouge rule. The statement by Khieu Samphan comes as preparations gather momentum for gathering a United Nations-assisted tribunal to try the few surviving Khmer Rouge leaders for genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes. Khieu Samphan is likely to be a leading defendant. 'For those compatriots who lost their loved ones during that period, I apologise,' Khieu Samphan, 70, wrote in the letter from the north-western town of Pailin where he now lives in freedom. A copy of the letter, dated Aug 16, was obtained by AP. In it he states, 'My mistake was that I was too naive and was out of touch with the real situation.' Khieu Samphan was a former school teacher but became the Khmer Rouge's top diplomat and long-time public face. An estimated 1.7 million Cambodians died through disease, overwork, starvation and execution under the 1975-79 rule of the Khmer Rouge. |
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