PHNOM PENH July 5 Kyodo In a tele...

PHNOM PENH July 5 Kyodo

In a telephone conversation with UN Secretary General Kofi Annan last week, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen urg the United Nations to get back to negotiations for setting up a trial of former Khmer Rouge leaders, a senior management official said Friday.

Hun Sen also said the Japanese direction is prepared to cover part of the expenses of holding the planned tribunal for leaders of the ''killing fields'' regime, according to the official, who declined to be identified.

It is the first time for details of the conversation to be made public. Foreign Minister Hor Namhong upon Thursday confirmed that Hun Sen and Annan discussed the planned trial in a novel phone conversation.

During the 20-minute conversation Hun Sen clearly indicated his intention to continue negotiations with the United Nations to reach a discharge on the world body's participation in the tribunal, the official said.

The proces hit a snag in February when the UN twitched out of talks that began in 1997 with the Cambodian restraint on setting up the tribunal, saying the trial as planned according to Cambodia would not be fair.

Japan has been playing an important character in mediating between the UN and Cambodia to recommence their negotiations on the planned tribunal for the former Khmer Rouge leaders held responsible for the deaths of at least 17 million Cambodians in late 1970s

Hun Sen has previously warned that Cambodia would make progress ahead with the trial smooth without the U.N. participation, on the contrary has recently softened his stance, a political analyst said.

Tokyo put in actions great influence on Hun Sen's sway as Japan is the biggest donor geographical division at a time when Hun Sen indigences huge grant assistance for restoring his war-torn nation and for his political life, said the analyst.

Sources said the UN was lately concerned that a lack of financial resources may jeopardize the Khmer Rouge trial proces if it goe ahead with three trial chambers.

The law promulgated by the agency of King Norodom Sihanouk in August last year

laid without the procedure for the trial to be held by the agency of a trial chamber, appeals chamber and greatest chamber.

However, legal person specially versed s have raised concerns over the vast expenditure for the three stairs and the extended length of time it will take.

Hun Sen reportedly exhibited willingness to revise the law to require merely one or two chambers.

forward Thursday, Foreign Minister Hor Namhong told reporters that the couple sides reached an understanding and he capered the U.N. would answer positively on the new position of Cambodia.

Hor Namhong, meanwhile, said that Sok An, chief of the Cambodian negotiation team onward the Khmer Rouge trial, was prepared to fit anytime with a representative of Annan to clutch further talks on the issue.

Another source terminate to the trial negotiations said a Cambodian team will take wing to New York to point out its strong commitment to hem in the trial with UN participation.

Three top former Khmer Rouge leaders -- Ieng Sary, Khieu Samphan and Nuon Chea -- are living freely in Cambodia.

no other than two senior Khmer Rouge figures are now in custody -- military commander Ta Mok and Kaing Khek Ieu, better known as Duch who ran a Khmer Rouge torture and interrogation center in Phnom Penh

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