Sisowath Sirik Matak (22 January 1914 – 21 April 1975) was a Cambodian politician and member of the Cambodian royal family, under the House of Sisowath. Sirik Matak was mainly notable for his involvement in Cambodian politics, particularly for his involvement in the 1970 change in power against his cousin, then Prince Norodom Sihanouk, and for his subsequent establishment, along with Lon Nol, of the Khmer Republic.
The Khmer Rouge communists initiated their dry-season offensive to capture the beleaguered Cambodian capital on 1 January 1975. On 1 April 1975, President Lon Nol resigned and fled the country into exile in Hawaii; the Khmer Rouge had published a ‘death list’ with his name at the top, and their forces had now surrounded the capital.
On 12 April 1975, United States Ambassador to Cambodia John Gunther Dean offered high officials of the Khmer Republic political asylum in the United States, but Sirik Matak, Long Boret, and Lon Non, along with other members of Lon Nol’s cabinet, declined – despite the names of Boret and Sirik Matak being published by the Khmer Rouge in a list of “Seven Traitors” marked for execution. Sirik Matak’s written response to the ambassador stated:
“Dear Excellency and friend,
I thank you very sincerely for your letter and for your offer to transport me towards freedom. I cannot, alas, leave in such a cowardly fashion.
As for you and in particular for your great country, I never believed for a moment that you would have this sentiment of abandoning a people which has chosen liberty. You have refused us your protection and we can do nothing about it. You leave us and it is my wish that you and your country will find happiness under the sky.
But mark it well that, if I shall die here on the spot and in my country that I love, it is too bad because we are all born and must die one day. I have only committed the mistake of believing in you, the Americans.
Please accept, Excellency, my dear friend, my faithful and friendly sentiments. Prince Sirik Matak.”
The letter was reproduced and added to the book Autrefois, Maison Privée.”
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