PHNOM PENH, Cambodia -- In the end he was alone, the last fighter left in the brutal three-decade-long Khmer Rouge insurgency. As his colleagues surrendered and were embraced by the government, the peasant general Ta Mok remained in the jungle, searching in vain for a place to hide.

Last week he was captured, apparently through a deal with Thai military units that had given him sanctuary across the border. Instead of the embrace that greeted his comrades after their surrenders, Ta Mok, a battlefield leader with a reputation for cruelty, was locked in a prison cell to await trial.

In the harsh politics of Cambodia today, it is possible that Ta Mok will be the only Khmer Rouge leader called to account for the deaths of more than a million people between 1975 and 1979.

The politics of the moment suggest that his Khmer Rouge colleagues could be left free to enjoy a quiet retirement.

Their fate is in the hands of Prime Minister Hun Sen, whose word is law here. So far, he has resisted calls from abroad -- and from many Cambodians -- for the arrests of such prominent Khmer Rouge defectors as Khieu Samphan, Nuon Chea and Ieng Sary.

On Friday, Cambodia's foreign minister, Hor Nam Hong, formally rejected a recommendation by the United Nations that a score of Khmer Rouge leaders, including Ta Mok, be turned over to an impartial international tribunal. Any trials, he said, would be held here.

The most hated Khmer Rouge leader, Pol Pot, died in April. It appears that the government hopes Ta Mok will become his surrogate as the focus for recriminations.

"Ta Mok will be made a sacrificial animal, like the Gang of Four in China," said Lao Mong Hay, a prominent human rights advocate. "If that happens, the issue of a Khmer Rouge trial and the Khmer Rouge massacres and the Cambodian suffering will not have been solved."

Pub Date: 3/14/99