Cambodian route to Thailand cut

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 33814, 10 April 1975, Page 13

Cambodian route to Thailand cut

.\eu : Zealand Press Association—Copyright)

PHNOM PENH, April 9.

Khmer Rouge insurgents today cut Cambodia's overland supply route with Thailand and pressed toward Phnom Penh from three directions, military sources said.

Unconfirmed reports said that the insurgents around the capital and its airport had begun firing mortar and recoilless rifles—short-range weapons that are more accurate than the rockets and artillery they had been using.

Fresh insurgent troops were reported to have moved to the east bank of the Mekong River across from Phnom Penh and engaged in round-the-clock fighting with Government troops. Military sources also reported insurgent pressure southeast of Phnom Penh and slight penetrations of the capital’s north-west defence perimeter. The insurgents cut route 5 linking the province capital of Battambang with the Thai! border, but military sources!

said that Government forces) launched a drive to reopen it. The road and a parallel railway line have been used Ito haul foodstuffs atid other ! supplies from Thailand to [Battambang and from there by air to Phnom Penh. Western observers believe that the rebels need only a concerted effort to capture Battambang, Cambodia’s second city 180 miles northwest of Phnom Penh. Fighting also was reported throughout nearby Oddor Ma Chey Province, which borders Thailand. Thailand’s Military Command has sent 2000 troops to Aran Yaprathet across the border ’ from the once-sleepy Cambodian town of Poipet,

now a bulging centre for Cambodians preparing to flee to Thailand.

Fighting continued today in the eastern end of Kompong Speu, a province capita] 30 miles south-west of Phnom Penh. Western observers were puzzled why the insurgent command was attacking targets in the provinces rather than moving all its (forces against Phnom Penh. Meeting denied In Peking Prince Norodom Sihanouk denied a reported statement bv the Thai Foreign Minister (General Chatichai Choonhaven) that the Cambodian Prime Mini-] ster (Mr Long Boret) had; four-hour talks in Bangkok] with a representative of “the other side” to try to negoti-1 ate terms for a cease-fire. . Prince Sihanouk, president, (of the United National Front] of Cambodia (F.U.N.K.), said] in a written statement: “1] solemnly declare that no member of our movement) (neither Khmer Rouge, Siha-i noukist nor any other) has] had rhe slightest contact with] the super-traitor Long Boret,; or any other.” He continued: "The socalled representative of the so-called other side is a figment of the too-fertile imagination of the Thai authorities, noted specialists in falsehood.”

He added that at the outside, Mr Boret might have met a Phnom Penh Cambodian “disguised by the C.I.A. as a member of F.U.N.K.’’