4 - The “Dilemma” of Recognition: New Zealand and Cambodia

Summary

Introduction

New Zealand's relations with Cambodia have not been substantial — there has never been an embassy in Phnom Penh — but diplomatic recognition from 1978 to 1990 was one of the more controversial episodes in New Zealand's diplomatic history. New Zealand acquiesced to the requests of both its ASEAN friends and China, and recognized, first of all, Khmer Rouge representation, and then a coalition that included the Khmer Rouge (including their occupancy of the UN seat). Subsequently, after the Paris Accords, New Zealand made a major contribution (by New Zealand standards) to the peacekeeping mission in Cambodia.

Although New Zealand's controversial recognition policy towards Cambodia in those years ran parallel to that adopted by the United States, the documentary evidence shows that it was Thai, and to a lesser extent Chinese, officials, who persuaded New Zealand to maintain its position — perhaps contrary to what many have assumed. In fact, there is no real evidence that Washington played any kind of leading role in convincing New Zealand to hold the line. But the decision to recognize the Khmer Rouge at the United Nations, and subsequently the resistance coalition, did not sit easily with a succession of New Zealand leaders. Robert Muldoon, while Prime Minister, expressed his displeasure directly to Thai officials over the ongoing role of the Khmer Rouge. The subsequent Lange Administration made more public its dislike of the Khmer Rouge factions within the coalition that it recognized at the UN table, and Foreign Minister Russell Marshall openly referred to the policy as a “dilemma”. Moreover, New Zealand decision-makers were of the opinion that the ongoing hostilities between Vietnam and the three Cambodian resistance groupings merely played into the hands of the Soviet Union — but they were unable to convince their counterparts in the United States, Thailand, and China. Furthermore, the New Zealand public could never understand a policy that appeared to recognize the Pol Pot regime in exile — a regime that, while in government, had been one of the most monstrous in history. Despite this unhappiness with ASEAN's policy on Cambodia, there was never any serious contemplation of going against it. New Zealand would try to persuade ASEAN, but would always abide by ASEAN's final decision — until the break finally came in 1990 during the Cambodian peace process.