‘A Benevolent Despotism’

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32251, 20 March 1970, Page 15

‘A Benevolent Despotism’

; (N.Z.P.A.-Reuter—Copyright) HONG KONG, March 19. ! Prince Norodom Sihanouk has ruled iCambodia with a kind of benevolent despotism since 1941, in the successive roles of King, Prime Minister and Head of State. An ardent nationalist who astutely guided his small State away from the civil warfare that afflicted neighbouring Vietnam and Laos, the 47-year-old Prince also trod a tightrope between the conflicting ideologies of South-East Asia. He saw no anomaly, for instance, in founding “The Royal Socialist Youth Movement.”

He likes to play and compose Western jazz music, but ensured that his own children were taught traditional Khmer dancing.

Visitors to Cambodia are shown not only new factories (some of them built with Chinese aid) but also the

floodlit ruins of the ancient temple city of Angkor Wat. Prince Sihanouk used to act in plays staged at his court, then became interested 1 in film-making. He has directed several full-length col- ■ our films, for which he wrote the story and the music, and in some of which he played leading roles. He is also a practising journalist, and personally edited every bill and draft law before it was debated. Touring his country, by car or helicopter, he would distribute gifts of food, cloth or money to villagers, or even strip to shorts and sandals to join in digging projects and farm work. To the seven million people of Cambodia—who regularly re-elected him with huge majorities, he combined the aura of a former king, a world statesman and the grass-roots appeal of a skil- . ful and volatile politician. In the past, his relations with the United States were stormy. Cambodia rejected American aid in 1963 ;.~fl two , years later broke off diplo- ; matic relations after saying the United States attacked i Cambodian border villages. These were restored in April, 1969, after the United States formally announced its willingness to respect the country’s present frontiers. Relations with the Soviet . Union, once strained, are now friendly. But Prince ' Sihanouk regarded France , and China as Cambodia’s two i best friends. In 1966 he received PresiI dent Charles de Gaulle on an . official visit, and he himself i made half a dozen State visits . to Peking. On one of them, in 1964, * he told his hosts in an airport ■ speech: ’ “I regret that I was not 1 born a proletarian, but my ‘ desire is to remain a simple ; servant of the Cambodian ' people and to contribute to • the victory of the people’s forces throughout the world.” But he steered a basically . central course between East t and West. Foreigners were frequently , baffled by his unpredictabilI ity and many diplomats in . Phnom Penh the Cambodian > capital, regarded him as a - complete enigma. s Western observers there > said Prince Sihanouk felt it i best to come to terms with ■ China, since he believed that ultimately Peking could con-

trol the whole of South-East Asia. But on one of several occasions when he threatened resignation in order to get his own way in Cambodia’s domestic politics, he warned that a party system of Government or a military dictatorship would inevitably result in “throwing Cambodia into the arms of the United States and abandoning our independence and neutrality.”