Assassination bid fails

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32706, 8 September 1971, Page 17

Assassination bid fails

(N.Z. Press Association—Copyright) PHNOM PENH, September 7. Terrorists tried unsuccessfully today to kill the United States Ambassador to Cambodia, Mr Emory Swank, police sources said.

The plot failed when a bomb failed to explode.

The police sources said that Mr Swank was not injured in the incident.

The United States Embassy said only: “There was an incident involving a bicycle and the Ambassador’s car and we are investigating it”

According to the police sources, the terrorists pushed a bicycle with a bomb on it at the Ambassador's car as it was passing. Military police responsible for guarding Mr Swank recovered the bicycle and found a four-pound plastic explosive charge tied to the carrier behind the seat—enough explosives to blow Mr Swank’s car to pieces. .The sources said that the terrorists disguised themselves as a bread seller and two customers, and waited in front of the Than pagoda, where Mr Swank passes each morning at almost exactly the same time. Bread is often sold from the back of bicycles in Phnom Penh. was the first terror

attack aimed against Americans in Cambodia in nearly three months and the first against the highest ranking United States diplomat On June 15 a grenade was thrown at a carload of United States military attaches and plastic charges exploded in front of homes

of embassy marine guards and military attaches on June 1.