‘STATE OF DANGER’ Cambodia Revokes Rights

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32252, 21 March 1970, Page 11

‘STATE OF DANGER’ Cambodia Revokes Rights

(N.Z. Press Association—Copyright)

SAIGON, March 20.

Radio Phnom Penh said today that a “state of danger” had been declared in Cambodia and all constitutional rights had been revoked for six months, the Associated Press reported.

The broadcast, monitored in Saigon, said the suspension of rights was part of an assumption of emergency powers by the new Government after the coup that ousted the Chief of State (Prince Norodom Sihanouk).

The revocation of rights—including freedom of assembly and the press were put into effect for six months by the Royal council and the National Assembly which jointly carried out the coup. It would be subject to renewal at the end of that time, the radio said.

Tanks still guarded key Government buildings in Phnom Penh today and troops patrolled the streets but the situation was generally calm. There were no reports of fighting between Cambodian and Communist Vietnamese troops ranged along the border area with South Vietnam, and diplomatic sources said that both sides seemed to be adopting a “wait and see” policy. The North Vietnamese and

Viet Cong embassies—sacked last week by Cambodians angered by Vietnamese encroachmen* on Cambodian territory—remained closed and shuttered.

Diplomats from the two missions are believed to have taken temporary refuge in embassies of other Communist nations in Phnom Penh.

Unofficial sources, meanwhile, said that talks between Cambodian Government officials and the North Vietnamese on Cambodia’s demand that Communist forces withdraw from its territory had been suspended. No Protests Cambodians generally appeared to be taking calmly the fall on Wednesday of 47-year-old Prince Sihanouk, Head of State, since the country gained its independence from France in 1954. There have been no signs of pro-Sihanouk demonstrations. or of protests against the new leadership headed by

the interim Head of State, Mr Cheng Reng. Shops and businesses were open, and life in the capital was virtually normal. Only the few remaining tanks near the National Assembly and at other public buildings and the military patrols gave any hint of the events of the last few days. Telephone Links Telephone and telecommunications links with the outside world were re-estab-lished yesterday, and Phnom Penh airport may open again today to traffic from abroad. The general feeling was that Prince Sihanouk, at present being* accorded the honours of a Head of State in Peking, would not attempt to return.

Observers believed that the man who kept his country from the bloodshed that enveloped the rest of former French Indo-China in the last two decades, had lost popularity recently.