Who is Pol Pot?
Born on 19 May 1925 as Saloth Sar, Pol Pot was the Prime Minister of Cambodia from 1976 to 1978. While Pol Pot was in power, Cambodia was known as Democratic Kempuchea and underwent a series of experiments in order to become a socialist society. Pol Pot was born in the Kampung Thrum Province in Cambodia to a wealthy family. He was familiar with the royal family, since his sister was the concubine of a king. After attending college and technical schools in Cambodia, Pol Pot also studied in France and volunteered with the international labor brigade to build roads in Yugoslavia in 1950. While abroad, he became involved with the French Communist (PCF) anti-colonialist movement, which supported the Vietnamese war against France. Pol Pot joined a secret communist cell known as Cercle Marxiste that had taken over the Khmer Student Association (AER) that year, 1951. Failed exams forced Pol Pot to return to Cambodia in 1953. While teaching French literature and history, he became the link betw
He is a man who has always had difficulty telling others about himself. “I’m quite modest. I don’t want to tell people I’m a leader,” he says. Other revolutionaries have courted the press: Castro practically lives for sound bites, and the Zapatistas are better at planning press conferences than battles. But Pol Pot has never had the gift of the gab, especially around the camera, and he has never learned how to play to the press. Reporters saw him only as a cold-blooded killer; they missed his pensive side. The adulation that journalists showered on Castro and Marcos and Hafez al-Assad passed Pol Pot by. So, too, did the personal wealth that other dictators amassed. Pol Pot has never believed in greed. Not for him the diamonds of Mobutu, the snazzy clothes of Duvalier, the shoes of Marcos, the Swiss bank accounts of them all. When Pol Pot fell from power, he walked into the jungle with nothing but the clothes on his back. But that’s all in the past. The new Pol Pot is about the future.
