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$80-100 million to fund Pol Pot's fight against the Soviet bloc-backed PRK, includ-
ing cash payments which were made available directly through the Chinese embassy in
Bangkok. 13
The US, whose friendship with China was the key plank of its new policy orientation in
Asia, “winked, semi-publicly” at Beijing's support for the Khmer Rouge. “I encouraged
the Chinese to support Pol Pot,” President Carter's National Security Advisor Zbigniew
Brzezinski said in 1985. “Pol Pot was an abomination. We could never support him, but
China could.” 14 At a tense session in September 1979, the UN General Assembly voted
71-35 (with 34 abstentions) to continue recognizing DK as Cambodia's legitimate gov-
ernment—the first government-in-exile ever to be accorded the privilege. It would hold
the position in various guises until 1991. Robert Rosenstock, the American delegate to
the UN Credentials Committee, which drafted the resolution, recalled later how he was
instructed to “engineer” the results in a manner favorable to the US and its allies. “I think
I know how Pontius Pilate must have felt,” he commented to a colleague after a grateful
Ieng Sary came up to thank him after the vote. 15
By the end of 1979, the tragedy of Khmer Rouge rule had given way to a full-blown
moral farce. Despite occupying more than nine-tenths of Cambodia's territory, the new
regime in Phnom Penh was diplomatically isolated and politically ostracized, while Pol
Pot's emissaries were welcomed in the UN as the representatives of their former vic-
tims. Nursed back to health by the Chinese, and shielded by Western diplomatic cover,
the DK forces quickly rebuilt themselves into a feared military force. Many in the
West—including American officials like Rosenstock—professed to be disgusted with the
moral contortions of Cold War realpolitik, but Washington's overriding strategic interest
was the isolation of the Soviet bloc and its Vietnamese client. Cambodia and its suffer-
ings, as always, remained of secondary importance.
The isolation of the PRK held back much needed assistance and prolonged the painful
period of reconstruction. Strong US lobbying failed to prevent Western nations from
mounting a massive humanitarian effort in the early 1980s—the largest ever to that
point—but support dried up in 1983 when UN member states declared the period of
“emergency” at an end. Since it was under diplomatic embargo, UN agencies were
barred from providing development aid to the PRK, and only those with emergency man-
dates—like UNICEF and the UN High Commissioner for Refugees—could operate in-
side the country.
Humanitarian aid was used as a political tool by both sides. Western governments led
by the US imposed a ban on bilateral aid to Phnom Penh, forcing the PRK to survive on
handouts from Vietnam, the Soviet bloc, and Western volunteer organizations like Oxfam
UK, which insisted on working inside Cambodia. The PRK likewise used aid to advance
its own military and political objectives, demanding sole responsibility for its distribution
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