Prime Minister Hun Sen and his Vietnamese counterpart, Nguyen Tan Dung, yesterday presided over a commemoration to their fallen comrades who were killed in a landmark resistance battle against the Khmer Rouge.

Long Khan district in Vietnam’s Dong Nai province was the site of a brutal battle between Hun Sen’s troops and the Vietnamese battalions that aided him and Cambodian Khmer Rouge cadre.

“I would like to express gratitude to Nguyen Tan Dung, Le Kha Phieu [former president of Socialist Republic of Vietnam], and other leaders who took part during the ceremony, and wish to have a friendship tie between Cambodia and Vietnam that is sustainable and successful,” Hun Sen said in his speech broadcast by TV5 Cambodia yesterday.

The commemoration was for 49 of their fallen comrades at a newly built memorial in Long Khanh.

“We are making efforts to have prosperous development of the country and strengthen the friendship and unity and loyalty between Cambodia and Vietnam, and we are determined to prevent the dark nightmare [of the Pol Pot regime] to return again in Cambodia,” Hun Sen said.

Cheam Yeam, senior Cambodian People’s Party lawmaker, said that the memorial was located at an historical site of the Khmer resistance movement founded in Vietnam on December 2, 1978, with the support of the Vietnam Communist Party to topple Pol Pot from power.

“It is an historical event where 10,000 Vietnamese volunteer soldiers were killed or missing by helping Khmer resistance to topple the Pol Pot regime. The CPP and its supporters consider this as a core gratitude to Vietnam,” Cheam Yeap said.