YouSaid · the spoken record

Son Sann

THE RECORD WRITES THIS SPEAKER AS SON SANN

lines on the record: 137
first: 1959-09-24
most recent: 1989-09-24
sittings or episodes: 4
sources: un-general-debate

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“The Khmer soldiers forcibly enlisted by the enemy in order to serve as a pillar of the Phnom Phen regime have become an important force, participating actively with us in the national resistance movement. The irresistible vitality of the national union against the Vietnamese occupation has led to the military impasse into which the Vietnamese forces have been driven for several years, to a point where they are now mainly on the defensive, confined in towns and entrenched along the main lines of communication and in some strategic positions, isolated from one another and kept under repeated attacks by our forces. The Vietnamese forces are caught in the guerrilla net of our national resistance and that net keeps tightening upon them year after year.”
1987-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 42 (1987)
“"The scale and the enormity of the Vietnamese crimes have accelerated the national resistance, which is now mobilizing the entire people and an increasing number of soldiers, self-defence guards and civil servants at every level of the puppet Phnom Phen regime as they become aware of the real meaning of the struggle - which means the very survival of their nation and their national identity. The unceasing and extensive attacks launched by the national resistance forces in order to dismantle the administrative centres at village and commune levels have liberated the people and large tracts of territory and as a result have done much to dry up the human, economic and material resources of the enemy.”
1987-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 42 (1987)
“"In 1979, after the Vietnamese blitzkrieg, the situation in Kampuchea was very gloomy and even, for many people, desperate; indeed it seemed inconceivable that small, weak Cambodia could oppose a Viet Nam 10 times more populated, infatuated with its powerful army - ranking third in the world - puffed up with pride after a long and, in addition, strongly supported and armed by the Soviet Union. For the Vietnamese leaders, the Cambodia case was definitively settled, the situation being irreversible and their dream of an Indochina federation being at last realized. Today it is well known to all that this dream, far from being a reality, has truly turned into a nightmare.”
1987-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 42 (1987)
“' The resolution also stresses that, inter alia, 'the continuing illegal occupation of Kampuchea and the reported demographic changes in Kampuchea are a threat to the survival of the Kanpuchean people and culture.' "The Vietnamese crimes in Cambodia bear witness to the fact that the war stirred up and sustained by the leaders in Hanoi is not an ordinary war of aggression as witnessed so far in world history but rather a war of genocide. As a corollary, they show that we have the right to fight against an implacable and perfidious enemy, whose cynicism is equalled only by the refinement of its hideous crimes. They explain why the sacred goal of our struggle, beyond the liberation of our motherland is the very survival of our nation and people, the preservation of our national identity.”
1987-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 42 (1987)
“The United Nations Commission on Human Rights has never believed that and every year, by an overwhelming majority, it adopts a resolution which, inter alia, 'reaffirms that the continuing illegal occupation of Kampuchea by foreign* - that is Vietnamese - 'forces deprives the people of Kampuchea of the exercise of their right to self-determination and constitutes the primary violation of human rights in Kampuchea at present.”
1987-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 42 (1987)
“"Judging by the endless flow of the ill-fated boat people, the regime imposed on the Vietnamese people by the leaders in Hanoi is one of the worst dictatorships that have ever existed in the world. More than a million Vietnamese - men, women, children, the elderly - have already fled their native country, preferring to risk their future to the often deadly perils of the sea rather than to living under the repressive regime imposed upon them. Thousands of others continue to do so every month. Who can still believe that the Vietnamese leaders are philanthropists who have mobilized all the resources of their country and sent hundreds of thousands of Vietnamese soldiers to fight and die for the freedom of the Cambodian people when they have not been able to ensure a decent standard of living for their own people?”
1987-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 42 (1987)
“"According to directives broadcast on 6 June 1987, the first objective of the celebration of the thirty-sixth anniversary of the founding of the Communist Party of the puppets in Phnom Phen was; to demonstrate clearly that the Kampuchean People's Revolutionary Party has its origin in the Indochinese Communist Party founded by President Ho Chi Minh and that all the victories of the Kampuchean revolution have always been linked with the revolution of Viet Nam and Laos. ' "One of the keynotes of this celebration was that: 'President Ho Chi Minh, founder of the Indochinese Communist Party, lives forever in the revolutionary cause of our country. ' "I shall not add any comment to that exuberant and enthusiastic pride of the Phnom Phen puppets at being Viet Nam's subjects and working for the elimination of the identity of their own nation.”
1987-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 42 (1987)
“Moreover, the obstinate refusal of the leaders in Hanoi to withdraw their forces and allow the Cambodian people to exercise their right to self-determination, in accordance with the relevant United Nations resolutions, reveals their will to pursue at all costs their policy of Indochina Federation', Despite their repeated denials, that policy is very much alive. In addition to numerous past and present proofs there is a quite recent one.”
1987-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 42 (1987)
“They did not understand why those same people, who for a span of 30 years of resolute patriotic struggle had managed to make their people and country a symbol of resistance to foreign domination and of struggle for national independence should have revealed themselves almost overnight to be - as we have known them to be for many centuries - a perfect model of an anachronistic imperialism, the expansionist strategy of which has become a principle of Government. "Nevertheless the persistence of the Vietnamese occupation of Cambodia has enabled the most sceptical, and even some supporters of Viet Nam, to face the facts. The longer this occupation lasts, the greater is the evidence of Vietnamese crimes in Cambodia.”
1987-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 42 (1987)
“The ultimate goal is all-out Vietnamization, body and soul, of Cambodia as in the cases of the Islamic Kingdom of Champa, which was absorbed in the seventeenth century to form the present-day Central Viet Nam, and of Lower Cambodia - Kampuchea Krom - which was annexed to form the present-day South Viet Nam, In order to escape from this Vietnamese steamroller, almost a million Cambodians have been obliged to go into exile and inside the country millions of others have fled their native villages and lands to seek refuge in remote areas or in areas controlled by our national resistance forces. "For many people, first the invasion of Cambodia and then the array and scale of the crimes committed by the leaders in Hanoi called for a heart-rending explanation.”
1987-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 42 (1987)
“"In the currently occupied areas where, according to Vietnamese propaganda, a marvellous rebirth has been taking place the population is subjugated, oppressed, arrested, imprisoned, tortured and killed under the slightest pretext or suspicion in the very presence of Vietnamese 'experts', or simply sent to the notorious re-education camps from where people never return. The Vietnamese-installed Phnom Penh regime is one of terror and oppression. "This entire exercise of physical elimination is carried out in parallel with a planned attempt to eliminate the Khmer culture. Cambodia's history, and in particular that of its relations with Viet Nam, is rewritten/ while in schools maps already show Viet Nam, Laos and Kampuchea as a single geographical entity.”
1987-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 42 (1987)
“Several tens of thousands of those conscripts have been killed by mines or maimed for life, while many hundreds of thousands of others have been stricken by malaria. In the name of the 'Viet Nam-Kampuchea special friendship and solidarity', hundreds of thousands of Cambodian villagers have been expelled militarily and their houses, fields and rice fields have been expropriated and later distributed to Vietnamese settlers who already number more than 700,000, I systematically sent to settle in Cambodia, within the framework of a well-defined settlement policy.”
1987-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 42 (1987)
“Excelling in the art of turning themselves into victims and shifting the responsibility for their crimes on to others, the leaders in Hanoi have baptized their occupation of Cambodia 'national defence' against an 'undeclared war'. Proceeding under that banner, they forcibly conscripted tens of thousands of Cambodians aged between 15 and 45 and sent them to the battlefields to fight and die for the defence of the Vietnamese occupation of Cambodia. Since 1984, under the pretence of 'labour in defence of the motherland' and 'jungle clearing', they have conscripted more than 1 million men and women, young and old alike, and sent them to carry out forced paramilitary labour in mine infested battlefields and malaria and endemic disease-ridden mountainous and forest areas.”
1987-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 42 (1987)
“"Like Hitler's Panzer divisions which were dispatched for the so-called liberation of Czechoslovakia in 1938 and Poland in 1939, the Vietnamese divisions sent to Cambodia for its so-called liberation, in their blitzkrieg and later in their countless mopping-up operations, razed entire villages, looted and destroyed public and private property, crops, fields and rice fields, and massacred or starved to death hundreds of thousands of Cambodians. With a view to eliminating any kind of resistance to their so-called liberation, the Vietnamese forces did not hesitate to use toxic chemical and bacteriological weapons to suppress all those whom they could not reach with their conventional weapons.”
1987-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 42 (1987)
“His faith in the United Nations Charter and his dedication to fulfilling his high mandate, which is both complex and exacting, and often thankless, have greatly contributed to strengthening the role of our world Organization in the maintenance of international peace and security. "My country, Cambodia, has the tragic misfortune of being the prey long coveted by its big predatory neighbour, Viet Nam, whose half-century-old ambition to absorb it into its 'Indo-China Federation' is now well known to all. Never in their long history have the Cambodian people endured such cruel humiliation, grief, misery and suffering as that sown by the Socialist Republic of Viet Nam since 25 December 1978, the day of the invasion of my country.”
1987-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 42 (1987)
“"May I be permitted to pay an earnest tribute to his honourable predecessor, Mr. Humayun Rasheed Choudhury, an eminent son of Bangladesh, who has brilliantly proved himself to be a man of remarkable diplomatic skills, of wisdom and impartiality in conducting the work of the forty-first session of the General Assembly. "Last but not least, I should like to render a fervent and ringing homage to our very distinguished Secretary-General, Mr. Javier Perez de Cuellar, whom we hold in very high esteem. I am particularly pleased to stress that his untiring and deserving efforts strengthen the confidence we have always had in him.”
1987-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 42 (1987)
“May I be permitted first of all to extend to Mr. Peter Florin my deepest personal congratulations on his election to the presidency of this Assembly and to wish him full success in his mission. Today I have the great honour to deliver the message of His Royal Highness Samdech Norodom Sihanouk, President of Democratic Kampuchea, addressed to the forty-second session of the Assembly. This is the message of His Royal Highness; "It is a pleasure for me to extend to Mr. Peter Florin, on behalf of the people of Democratic Kampuchea, their Coalition Government and on my own behalf, our sincere congratulations on his election to the presidency of the United Nations General Assembly at its forty-second session. His political and diplomatic experience, as well as his great personal skill, are tokens that will ensure the success of our work.”
1987-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 42 (1987)
“We believe that the truth is not the prerogative of any particular system, but is to be found to some extent in all, and that the most elementary common sense requires us all to recognize this." [756th meeting, para. 5] 138. If this view, which I believe many of you at heart share, were accepted, we would have made a great stride forward on mankind's path of progress.”
1959-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 14 (1959)
“Such an understanding is more than ever necessary for the establishment of a lasting peace, based on coexistence in the form of constructive competition among the different civilizations and technologies of the world. 136. Cambodia is a neutral country, allied to none but friendly to all, and in participating in the fourteenth session of the General Assembly it is firmly resolved to make its full contribution, however modest, to the relaxation of international tension. 137. In conclusion, I wish to recall the words of His Royal Highness Prince Norodom Sihanouk to this Assembly at its thirteenth session: "We want to be able to support any proposal which we regard as just and reasonable, regardless of its sponsors' political complexion.”
1959-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 14 (1959)
“We should act in order to clear this cold war atmosphere, an atmosphere of constant suspicion, mutual recriminations, scarcely veiled threats, and even deliberate interference in the internal affairs of neighbouring countries; if that situation is allowed to continue indefinitely, it will expose mankind to certain material and spiritual self-destruction. 135. We have long witnessed the heartrending spectacle of two-thirds of the globe living in poverty, hunger and distress, side by side with the remaining third which has the means that are needed to banish those evils. We believe that our Assembly should at last launch a widespread movement to promote understanding among all Powers.”
1959-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 14 (1959)
“The Cambodian delegation welcomes with deep Satisfaction the news that an Economic Policy Board, under the chairmanship of the Secretary-General, has been established for the purpose of providing greater flexibility and better co-ordination in handling requests to the United Nations for technical assistance. Nothing is more to be desired than a closer co-ordination of the various international technical assistance programmes with those of the Special Fund and other bodies. The Cambodian delegation is confident that this Board will play an effective role in the judicious allocation of United Nations technical assistance. 133. The whole world is looking to the United Nations, on which are centred mankind's hopes for the building of a peaceful and prosperous future. Our Organization must at all costs avoid disappointing those hopes. 134.”
1959-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 14 (1959)
“Our Secretary-General himself has often stated that the gap, already wide, between the prosperous countries and those less fortunate is steadily increasing- 131. The Cambodian delegation wishes to pay a tribute to the far-sightedness of the Secretary-General, who has also stated that the difficult economic situation of many Asian and African nations calls for a new sense of responsibility and a heightened desire to help on the part of those more fortunate. If such reactions do not find expression in practical and constructive action, there is bound to be a danger of instability in the poorer countries, which would reflect on the political world situation. The Cambodian delegation hopes that these words will be heeded by all Member States. 132.”
1959-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 14 (1959)
“Our organization should strive to direct more of its efforts and those of its specialized agencies towards solving the vital problems confronting the world, especially the problem of under-development and the problem of the rational use of atomic energy for peaceful purposes in order to improve the economic and social life of all peoples. In that field it must be frankly admitted that, despite its praiseworthy efforts, the United Nations has taken no more than the first step. 129. In 1958, for example, despite an overwhelming population pressure, the increase in world production was a mere 3 per cent. Such a situation has a direct influence on the maintenance of peace and international security. 130.”
1959-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 14 (1959)
“There have already been reassuring signs, for example the Soviet exhibition in New York and the United States exhibition in Moscow, the official visits of Soviet leaders to the United States and of United States leaders to the Soviet Union, the fairly encouraging results of the Geneva Conference on the Discontinuance of Nuclear Weapons Tests, the official visit of the Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR to the United States, and the forthcoming official visit of the President of the United States to the Soviet Union. We gladly welcome these signs of a relaxation of tension. 128.”
1959-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 14 (1959)
“We believe that the time has come for statesmen to realize that the age of imperialism and foreign conquest is over, and that Governments should bend their efforts not to interfering in the internal affairs of their neighbours but to promoting the economic and cultural development of their own country and of the world as a whole. What we must fight against now is the spectre of poverty, hunger and all forms of under-development. 126. The Cambodian delegation believes that the present session of the General Assembly could make a major contribution, in more ways than one, to the decrease of international tension, 127. The few results that were achieved by the Foreign Ministers' Conference show that it is possible for East and West to agree on certain crucial problems.”
1959-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 14 (1959)
“We naturally deplore the division of the world into blocs, but we do not feel that we have any right to criticize the attitude of any other country, so long as it does not attempt to interfere with our own right to self-determination. 124. As a logical consequence of this position our Government has not hesitated, despite the serious cause for alarm that it was given at the beginning of this year, to seek agreement with neighbouring Powers whose system of government and foreign relations are very different from its own. Notable progress has been achieved, which has contributed to the maintenance of peace and stability in South East Asia. 125.”
1959-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 14 (1959)
“Neutrality may not be the best solution for our country, but it is the least harmful, since it enables us to achieve national unity, and to avoid the disappointments that we would probably suffer at the hands of some countries and the blows dealt us by others against which we would be powerless to defend ourselves. 123. I would like to stress that we have never sought to act as propagandists for neutrality, and that we fully understand that nations may wish to undertake commitments or align themselves with others if they believe that they can thereby better safeguard their interests or their national existence.”
1959-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 14 (1959)
“In the present circumstances the neutral countries, with their lack of military strength, their absence of any spirit of conquest and in general their disinterested attitude, appear to be best fitted to make a clear and dispassionate estimate of international crises. 121. My country is more than ever convinced that it is perfectly possible for peoples to achieve friendship, mutual understanding and peaceful coexistence in spite of differences in their ideologies and political systems, and it was in that belief that we recently reaffirmed, on the occasion of the fourth anniversary of the Bandung Conference, our faith in the principles of peaceful coexistence, the only principles that will enable countries with different ideologies to maintain friendly relations on a basis of equality, honour and dignity. 122.”
1959-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 14 (1959)
“Certain problems are inevitably raised year after year, and the result is inevitably a deadlock for which a purely illusory solution is found by the adoption of a large number of resolutions which are theoretical rather than practical. 119. During the thirteenth session, the head of our Government had occasion to outline to the Assembly steps that he thought might usefully be taken in order to enable the United Nations to play a more effective role. I shall not repeat what was said then, but there is one point that I would like to stress: the role of the small Powers, especially those that do not belong to any bloc. 120.”
1959-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 14 (1959)
“But unfortunately, as the Chairman of the Cambodian delegation, His Royal Highness Prince Norodom Sihanouk, pointed out last year, although the United Nations is playing an ever greater part in the life of all nations, its activities, which should have a universal character, are still seriously hampered by the existence within the Organization of hostile and conflicting blocs, so that the United Nations is prevented from playing its full role of supervision and censure, and is slowly being transformed into a forum for propaganda and the clash of opposing beliefs, while the Charter and the real aims of the United Nations are forgotten.”
1959-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 14 (1959)
“The Cambodian delegation earnestly hopes that the prestige of the United Nations, and its activities, will help to solve other such grave problems as those relating to security, disarmament, the peaceful coexistence of different systems and ideologies, the reunification of countries now divided, and all forms of under-development; in short, that it will help to establish a new kind of international stability, based on new rules. 118.”
1959-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 14 (1959)
“Ambassador Johan Beck-Friis was simply an intermediary who placed himself at the disposal of the two Governments in order to facilitate the restoration of diplomatic relations between them and pave the way for improved relations between the two countries. 116. We believe that this new course followed by the Secretary-General is a most promising one. It made prompt intervention possible without involving the prestige of the Organization in case of failure. This is a tactful and ingenious procedure which provides a most useful method of solving problems for those nations which have a genuine respect for the United Nations Charter. 117.”
1959-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 14 (1959)
“As a result of this visit a joint "communique” was issued expressing the wish of both Governments to strengthen good neighbourly relations between them, and their determination to refrain from any form of interference in each other’s internal affairs, in a spirit of understanding and mutual respect for the freely chosen policy of each of the two Kingdoms. For its part, Cambodia is resolved to settle these disputes in accordance with the United Nations Charter. 115. But it is important to stress the entirely novel character of the procedure adopted by the Secretary-General. His representative was neither an observer responsible for reporting the facts, nor an arbiter whose task was to induce the parties to accept a given solution.”
1959-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 14 (1959)
“After a period of rather alarming tension between the two countries, the Secretary-General was kind enough to send his personal representative, Ambassador Johan Beck-Friis, to Thailand and Cambodia. Full credit for the happy outcome of this intervention is due to the weighty influence of Mr. Hammarskjold and the skill of his representative, which made possible the restoration of diplomatic relations between the two countries and the creation of a better atmosphere. 114. As a result the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Thailand paid a visit to Cambodia, during which the Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the two countries explored the possibilities for a friendly settlement of the problems at issue.”
1959-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 14 (1959)
“The United Nations now exercises a sure influence on the international scene, and it is in our Organization that men of goodwill place all their hopes for the building of a better future. There has been some progress in this direction, and it can be said that in spite of some unavoidable fumbling and occasional setbacks, the United Nations has done valuable work. 113. In that connexion, I feel in duty bound to call the Assembly’s attention to the recent intervention by the United Nations, at the instigation of our wise and energetic Secretary-General, in the dispute which arose between Cambodia and Thailand. There was a full report on this intervention in the introduction to the annual report of the Secretary-General [A/4132/Add.1] and in the report itself [A/4132].”
1959-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 14 (1959)
“Like all other delegations, the Cambodian delegation is certain that under your wise guidance the work of the present session will be accomplished in an atmosphere of full co-operation and mutual understanding. 109. Our Governments have sent us as representatives to this Assembly in the confident hope that our work will lead to positive and constructive results in the strengthening of peace and security in the world. 110. More than ever before, the main concern of all peace-loving people is the stabilization of the international situation. This goal towards which we are all striving is based on mankind's continually increasing awareness that it has a common purpose. 111. In view of the fearful possibilities of destruction created by modern science and technology, the division of the world into rival blocs has become a deadly danger. 112.”
1959-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 14 (1959)
“108. The Cambodian delegation takes particular pleasure in associating itself with the delegations which have previously extended congratulation to you, Sir, on your election to the high office of President of the fourteenth session of the General Assembly. This election is the crowning point of a career that has been devoted to the United Nations' efforts for peace and to understanding among peoples, and it is all the more welcome to Cambodia because some twelve years ago, at an important international conference, the representatives of my country had the opportunity of appreciating to the full your spirit of impartiality and fairness.”
1959-09-24 · UN General Assembly · General Debate, Session 14 (1959)