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GREAT-POWER POSTURING AND THE KHMER ROUGE TRIBUNAL
John D.
Ciorciari
For the
past several years, most media treatment of the proposed Khmer Rouge (KR)
tribunal has focused on negotiations between the United Nations and the
Cambodian government. The focus on UN officials is unsurprising, since they have
been the most visible international participants in the process of shaping a
tribunal. However, UN diplomats are only the front-line representatives of large
international bureaucracies, which in turn are heavily influenced by the world’s
most powerful states. This article investigates the role that some of the most
powerful members of the United Nations have played in promoting or frustrating
recent efforts to establish a KR tribunal.
The UN
Legal Department and its current head, Hans Corell, are certainly not mere
puppets of the great powers. The personalities and belief systems of UN
representatives have doubtlessly influenced their conduct of negotiations with
the Cambodian government, as have bureaucratic politics within the United
Nations. Nevertheless, UN negotiators never operate free of the constraints of
great-power interests. In the case of Cambodia-long a site for strategic,
political, and ideological rivalry-great-power politics have left a particularly
strong historical imprint on UN policies. Although the Cold-War deadlock of the
1980s ended with the withdrawal of Vietnamese forces and the Paris Peace
Accords, contemporary politics surrounding the Khmer Rouge tribunal show that
Cambodia remains the subject of rivalry among the world’s most influential
states.
Since the
relative Soviet withdrawal from Indochina in the late 1980s, the two most
powerful military and political actors in mainland Southeast Asia have been
China and the United States. During the latter years of the Clinton
Administration, the U.S. government pushed- considerably, if not
wholeheartedly-for a KR tribunal, while China adamantly opposed trials of former
Communist Party of Kampuchea (CPK) leaders. The proposed KR tribunal became one
of many fronts along which Beijing and Washington struggled over perceived
issues of national sovereignty and human rights. Under the Bush Administration,
and especially since the attacks of September 11, U.S. support for a KR tribunal
has receded, while the People’s Republic of China (PRC) remains staunchly
opposed. With the world’s largest country against a tribunal and its most
powerful country ambivalent, the likelihood of credible trials for CPK leaders
is clearly diminished.
Chinese
Stonewalling
China has been the most
consistent and outspoken opponent of an internationally managed or supervised
tribunal for former Khmer Rouge leaders. PRC opposition has been explicit and
direct, based on the argument that an internationally controlled tribunal would
infringe upon Cambodia’s national sovereignty. There appear to be several
reasons for the strong PRC position against an international tribunal. First,
China’s strong support of the CPK during the 1975-1979 period makes the crimes
of the DK regime a sensitive matter to Beijing. Trials of former CPK leaders
would almost certainly reopen discussion about China’s role in sustaining the
Khmer Rouge and elicit strident international criticism.
Secondly,
an international tribunal would undoubtedly draw attention to the Maoist and
Communist features of the Pol Pot regime. Trials could provide a public
opportunity for Western powers and Communist dissidents to attack the
ideological enterprise of Communism and threaten the ideological prestige of the
Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leadership in Beijing. Some of the intended
parallels between Mao’s Great Leap Forward, the 1966-1968 Cultural Revolution,
and Angkar’s “Year Zero” program would be difficult for domestic and
international observers to miss.
A third
basis for Chinese opposition is that a tribunal under international (and
primarily Western) leadership would represent a major affirmation of the
principle that human rights abuses sometimes justify first-world encroachment
into the traditional “sovereign sphere” of developing nations. China’s recurring
disputes with the United States and others relating to human rights make it
extremely sensitive to such precedents, especially when a Khmer Rouge tribunal
would take place in its houyuan (backyard) of Southeast Asia. Beijing has long
perceived the Western human rights agenda as a thin veneer for neo-imperial
power politics and is suspicious of any process that would underscore its own
vulnerability to human rights critiques.
Finally,
the idea of an international tribunal with heavy Western influence offends
China’s sense of the balance of diplomatic power in Southeast Asia. Beijing
regards mainland Southeast Asia as a traditional area of Chinese influence and
perceives strong Western power in the region as a “hegemonic” affront to its
legitimate regional ambitions. Further, Beijing suspects that Western military,
economic, and diplomatic engagement in the region form part of a new strategy,
led by the United States, to engage in post-Cold War “containment” to preserve
continued U.S. dominance of the lucrative and strategically critical maritime
sea lanes of Southeast Asia. The formation of a Western-led KR tribunal would
signal continued U.S. primacy in a strategically and economically prized region
where China feels historically, culturally, and geographically entitled to
leadership.
American
Ambivalence
The role of the United
States in the tribunal negotiation process has been more ambiguous, as opinions
in Washington have been considerably more varied than those expressed in
Beijing. Outwardly, the U.S. government has consistently supported the creation
of a tribunal under strong international supervision. However, Washington has
been unwilling to lend the full force of its diplomatic arsenal against Phnom
Penh to bring an international tribunal (or a mixed tribunal with
internationally accepted safeguards) to fruition.
If China
has frustrated the prospects for a tribunal via opposition, the United States
has hindered the process more through insufficient support or relative inaction.
While many U.S. political leaders, activists, and voters support the formation
of an international tribunal, Washington has been wary to push the issue too
forcefully. There appear to be a number of reasons. First, like China, the
United States has been widely criticized for its activities in Cambodia,
beginning with support for the Lon Nol regime and the bombing campaigns of
1970-73 and continuing through the 1980s, when the U.S. government supported a
Coalition Government of Democratic Kampuchea including the Khmer Rouge. Trials
could refocus international attention on U.S. Cold War policies in Indochina,
and reopen the political wounds of the Vietnamese War era, adding up to a
serious deterrent to many U.S. leaders. Republican supporters of the Nixon
administration, which carried out the bombing campaign of 1970-73, are
particularly sensitive to the possibility of reopening the Cambodian issue.
In
addition, some leaders in Washington are unwilling to support a process that
could inure to the benefit of Hun Sen, who has no shortage of political
adversaries in the United States. Many members of the U.S. Congress and
executive administration are veterans of the Vietnam War, and almost all lived
through an era in which Moscow, Hanoi, and their Cambodian allies formed
Washington’s mortal strategic and ideological adversaries. Other U.S. leaders
oppose Hun Sen for different reasons, citing his alleged human rights abuses and
authoritarianism. Senator Jesse Helms and Congresswoman Dana Rohrabacher even
proposed a resolution that would put Hun Sen on trial for war crimes rather than
the aging leaders of the Khmer Rouge.
U.S.
leaders are also conscious that pushing for an international tribunal carries
diplomatic costs. Offending China is only one of the costs. Washington must also
be concerned about the effect that its actions have in other developing states,
where leaders fear unwanted U.S. intervention. The Bush Administration appears
less willing to expend political capital on issues like the KR tribunal since
the War on Terrorism began in Autumn 2001. The anti-terrorist agenda threatens
to override other diplomatic issues and push them under the rug, just as Cold
War considerations did during the 1980s, as Washington prioritizes winning
support from foreign governments in the fight against militant Islamic
extremism.
Finally,
vocal U.S. leadership in an international tribunal would also be problematic in
an era when Washington has become the world’s most prominent critic of the new
International Criminal Court (ICC). Many American political leaders have
reservations about the United Nations and, more specifically, believe that
encouraging international trials will soon render U.S. leaders and servicemen
vulnerable to politically motivated prosecution. Washington has already been
widely accused of hypocrisy in its stance toward the ICC, and insisting upon an
international KR tribunal would likely intensify those accusations.
Of course,
many American leaders and activist groups remain committed to bringing former
CPK leaders to justice via an internationally managed or supervised criminal
tribunal. Human rights groups and prominent members of both political parties
have advocated the proposed trials, with the Democratic Left providing the most
consistent vocal support. Nevertheless, the overall U.S. position can only be
described as ambivalent. While China had openly lobbied the United Nations and
major states to avoid international trials, U.S. pressures have been a blend of
public and private encouragement and opposition.
Japanese and Indian
Tip-toeing
American
ambivalence and strong Chinese interests against a KR tribunal have left the
issue open for other major powers to step into greater roles in shaping the
process. Both Japan and India have expressed interest in the Khmer Rouge trials,
although both of these Asian powers have approached the matter with caution.
India is eager to assume a greater leadership role in the diplomacy of Southeast
Asia, as evident from its improved relations with Vietnam, Indonesia, and other
regional actors. New Delhi’s offer to support a mixed KR tribunal if the United
Nations permanently withdraws reflects an interest in the accountability process
and in assuming a higher profile in Southeast Asian diplomacy. However, India is
currently preoccupied with the conflict in Kashmir and is loath to offend
Beijing, a longtime ally of Pakistan. New Delhi is also concerned about the
re-emergent U.S.-Pakistani alliance and will continue to approach the KR
tribunal carefully, avoiding steps that would threaten its critical relationship
with Washington.
Japan has
likewise expressed interest in funding the Khmer Rouge tribunal and has offered
consistent normative support for an international legal proceeding against Khmer
Rouge leaders. Nevertheless, like India, Japan is constrained by its relations
with other major states active in the Asia-Pacific region. Its alliance with the
United States remains Japan’s dominant international security relationship, and
Tokyo has seldom taken diplomatic action in the region that would create tension
with Washington.
Japan has
also been wary of diplomatic initiatives that would offend neighboring Asian
countries, whose acute memory of Japanese imperialism and the “Greater East Asia
Prosperity Sphere” is evident in continued rows over history textbooks, Japanese
war memorials, and the like. The opposition Japan faces in asserting diplomatic
leadership in Southeast Asia was epitomized by Lee Kuan Yew, who once exclaimed
that allowing Japan to participate in the UNTAC peacekeeping mission was “like
giving chocolate liquers to an alcoholic.” Asian suspicions of Tokyo help to
explain why Japan has relied heavily on financial support, and not military or
political muscle, to exert its diplomatic influence in Asia. The KR tribunal is
likely to be no exception.
In sum,
both Tokyo and New Delhi have interests in assuming greater leadership in the KR
tribunal process, but both are cautious to avoid tension in their relations with
China or the United States. Neither India nor Japan is likely to pursue an
aggressive accountability campaign without a green or, at the very least, a
blinking yellow light from Washington.
Conclusion: A
Great-Power Muddle?
To
conclude, the impact of great-power politics on the search for accountability in
Cambodia has been mixed. During the late 1990s, the balance of great-power
influence was tipped in favor of a tribunal, but enthusiasm was never unanimous.
In the past year, the most powerful and relevant state in the greater
Asia-Pacific region-the United States-has shifted to a more ambivalent position,
and a divided Washington has arguably hindered the emergence of Khmer Rouge
trials as much as its has promoted them. The more enthusiastic policies of India
and Japan are promising, but their realization may well depend on renewed U.S.
interest.
Without
stronger great-power backing, UN negotiators may possess insufficient diplomatic
leverage to break their current impasse with the Cambodian government. Facing
only moderate pressure, Hun Sen and his negotiators have been unwilling to meet
UN demands for added procedural safeguards designed to ensure the fairness of
the trials. Cambodia’s recent receipt of $600 million in bilateral aid-$200
million more than it asked for-shows that Hun Sen’s alleged intransigence on the
tribunal issue has cost him little. If the past is any indication, the great
powers will need to apply considerably more pressure if the Cambodian government
is to accept trials that comply with inter-national (i.e., UN) demands.
To be sure,
there are many individuals in each of the great powers, along with variable
fractions of each state’s leadership, who support a tribunal on moral or
ideological grounds. However, evidence to date suggests that perceptions of
national self-interest have been at least as important as considerations of
justice in shaping the policies of the major powers, and those self-interests
have contributed to the absence of justice for the crimes of the CPK.
While
great-power politics are by no means the only factors holding up a KR tribunal,
they may become the most determinative variable as the negotiating process moves
forward. As the country with the greatest power resources and the most shifting
position toward a trial, the United States is probably the critical hinge. To
achieve credible justice in Cambodia, U.S. policymakers will have to overcome
their concerns and commit themselves to the promotion of the same human rights
so fundamental to the American political and ideological tradition.
_______________________
John D. Ciorciari is
the Wai Seng Senior Research Scholar at the Asian Studies Centre, University of
Oxford. |
