Swimming Through Cambodia

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PHNOM PENH, Cambodia: As the Clinton Administration hunts for a country willing to host an international Pol Pot trial, TIME's Doug Waller says U.S. officials believe they may never see the defendant in court. "It's a Rubik's Cube of angles," he says. "All there is to go on are the reports put out by one ruling faction," he says, "and the U.S. really shouldn't trust this. There's no telling what internal game they're playing." Waller notes that while both First Prime Minister Norodom Ranariddh and Second Prime Minister Hun Sen want to deliver Pol Pot as they battle for the political support of the Khmer Rouge, neither man is ready for hearings that could dredge up their links to Cambodia's bloody past. "While both of them want the support of the Khmer Rouge defectors who have turned against Pol Pot, both have aligned with Pol Pot in the past. So serving up him to a world court holds a lot of potential for embarrassment."