Thailand and Cambodia ink truce to halt border conflict
Thailand and Cambodia have agreed to halt weeks of violent border clashes between the Southeast Asian countries, the worst conflict in years that has included fighter jet sorties, rocket fire and artillery barrages.
“Both sides agreed to maintain their current troop deployments without further movement,” the defense ministers said in a joint statement about the ceasefire, which will come into force at noon local time on Saturday. he said.
“Any reinforcements will increase tensions and negatively impact long-term efforts to resolve the situation,” according to a statement posted on social media by the Cambodian Ministry of Defense.
The agreement, signed by Thai Defense Minister Natthaphon Nakrphanit and his Cambodian counterpart Tea Seiha, ended 20 days of fighting that left at least 101 people dead on both sides and displaced more than half a million people.
Clashes reignited in early December after the collapse of a ceasefire brokered by US President Donald Trump and Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim to halt the previous round of fighting.
Thailand and Cambodia have squabbled over sovereignty at various undefined points along their 817km land border for more than a century; This disagreement occasionally turns into clashes and clashes.
Natthaphon said the latest ceasefire would be monitored by a team of observers from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) regional bloc, as well as direct coordination between both countries.
“At the same time, at the policy level, there will be direct communication between the defense minister and the commander of the armed forces of both parties,” he told reporters.
Increasing tensions between the two countries came to a head in July this year; The neighbors clashed for five days on parts of the border, leaving at least 48 people dead and 300,000 displaced before Trump intervened to ‘establish a ceasefire’.
This ceasefire broke down in early December, with the two sides accusing each other of actions that led to clashes.
Since the conflict resumed, neither Anwar, now ASEAN chairman, nor Trump have been successful in brokering a new ceasefire; As the conflict spread from the jungle areas near Laos to the coastal provinces in the Gulf of Thailand.
The renewed talks follow a private meeting of Southeast Asian foreign ministers in Kuala Lumpur on Monday, followed by three days of talks between the warring sides at the border checkpoint, where the two defense ministers met on Saturday.
In their joint statement, the ministers agreed on the return of people displaced from the affected border areas, while underlining that both sides would not use any force against civilians.
According to the agreement, Thailand will also return 18 Cambodian soldiers detained since the clashes in July if the ceasefire is fully maintained for 72 hours.
But Saturday’s agreement made clear that this would not affect ongoing demarcation activities between both countries, leaving the task of resolving disputed areas along the border to existing bilateral mechanisms.
“War and conflicts do not make two countries or two people happy,” Thai Air Force Chief Marshal Prapas Sornjaidee told reporters.
“I want to emphasize that the Thai people and the Cambodian people are not in conflict with each other.”
