CAMBODIA Command says 2000 dead

Press, Volume CXIV, Issue 33527, 7 May 1974, Page 17

CAMBODIA Command says 2000 dead

<N.Z P.A.-Reuter —Copyright)

PHNOM PENH, May 6. iMore than 2000 Communist-led insurgents had been killed in fighting at the besieged southern coastal city of Kampot in the last two months, the Cambodian High Command claimed today.

Kampot, 85 miles southwest of Phnom Penh, has been under siege by insurgent forces since early March. Last month the insurgents broke through the city’s defences in the northern outskirts. and were forced back from the centre after heavy street fighting. Military sources said that troops defending Kampot had widened their perimeter, and were continuing their operations. Government casualties at Kampot were given as 116 soldiers killed and 1363 wounded.

The high command said Government troops had also recaptured a training camp abandoned to insurgent forces three days ago. The Long Vek training camp, was evacuated on May 3 after a fierce attack by 3000 insurgents. About 5000 troops regrouped near the camp, and launched an attack yesterday forcing the insurgents to withdraw. In South Vietnam, near the Cambodian border, more than 100 Communist troops have been killed, according to the South Vietnamese Command in Saigon. North Vietnamese troops last week struck across the border, taking the border post

of Long Khot. according to field reports. South Vietnam is reported to have sent armoured cars and infantry across the border to cut off the North Vietnamese assault force. The command in Saigon has denied that the post has fallen. Communist units kept up their pressure south of Tam Kym, in the coastal lowlands of the northern province of Quang Tin. Radio contact was lost with a village defended by two militia platoons after a pre-dawn attack yesterday.