NORODOM SIHANOUK

born Oct. 31, 1922, Phnom Penh, Cambodia Cambodia's king from 1941 to 1955; thereafter he was prime minister, head of state, and president, and in 1993 he became king again. He attempted to steer a neutral course in the civil wars and foreign wars from the 1960s to the '90s. Sihanouk was, on his mother's side, the grandson of King Monivong (reigned 192741), whom he succeeded on the throne at age 18. At the time Cambodia was a French protectorate, and Sihanouk wielded little power. Near the end of World War II, however, the young king, encouraged by the Japanese, who occupied the area, first attempted to declare Cambodia's independence from France; but, when French military forces moved back into the region, he decided to wait until France's retreat from Indochina, which occurred in 1954. He founded the Sangkum Reastr Niyum (People's Socialist Community) in January 1955, won a referendum in February approving its program, and on March 2 abdicated in favour of his father, Norodom Suramarit, becoming the new monarch's prime minister, foreign minister, and subsequently permanent representative to the United Nations. Five years later, after the death of his father (April 3, 1960), he accepted the role of head of state (June 13). Sihanouk steered a neutralist course in his foreign policy. In return for North Vietnamese nonsupport of the Khmer Communist Party (Khmer Rouge), he let Vietnamese communists operate covertly from bases inside eastern Cambodia. He steered clear of U.S. aid and assistance, relying on his immense popularity with the Cambodian people to keep radicals of both the right and the left under control. Under Sihanouk's benign rule, Cambodia experienced 15 years of fragile peace and mild prosperity while much of Southeast Asia was in a state of upheaval. Sihanouk's maintenance of Cambodian neutrality in the Vietnam War ended in 1970 when he was ousted in a U.S.-supported coup led by General Lon Nol. He then lived in Peking, campaigning on behalf of the Khmer Rouge underground. Following the Khmer Rouge takeover of Cambodia in 1975, Sihanouk returned home, only to be put under house arrest by the Khmer Rouge government; under dictator Pol Pot, a four-year reign of terror ensued as more than 1 million Cambodians were killed. Sihanouk was released in January 1979 because the Khmer Rouge regime was falling to Vietnamese military forces and needed an advocate in the United Nations. After denouncing the Vietnamese invasion, he dissociated himself from the Khmer Rouge as well. In 1982 Sihanouk became president of an uneasy coalition government-in-exile made up of the three principal anti-Vietnamese Khmer forcesthe Khmer Rouge, the anticommunist Khmer People's National Liberation Front, and Sihanouk's neutralist party. He retained his role as resistance leader until 1991, when he was elected president of Cambodia's Supreme National Council, an interim administrative body. In September 1993, following UN-sponsored elections in May 1993, Cambodia's National Assembly voted to restore the monarchy, and Sihanouk once again became king. His son, Norodom Ranariddh, became first prime minister. In mid-1997, however, Second Prime Minister Hun Sen staged a coup, ousting Ranariddh. Sihanouk remained on the throne, though Hun Sen wielded most of the political power.