[Thai] PM ready to clarify with PAD on border issues [-Just kill each other off and leave Cambodia alone!]

17/2/2011
Source: http://media.thaigov.go.th/pageconfig/viewcontent/viewcontent1e.asp?pageid=472&directory=1944&contents=54807

Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva gave an interview on the proposal of the Thai Broadcast Journalists Association to be an intermediary between the Government and the People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD) on Thailand - Cambodia border issues. The Prime Minister said that he had no problem with that proposal and would be willing to provide information, as all parties want to solve the problem and maintain territorial integrity and peace.

The Government had been committed to bilateral resolution of the problem, like what the PAD requested. So far, we had been able to do so because we adhered to the MoU 2000. The Prime Minister was ready to explain, as information had not changed. However, he said that we should talk about facts and be responsible to what we said. Working on this matter had to be very careful, because not all issues should be publicized and might affect the government’s efforts in the international community. The Prime Minister said that the Government was trying to seek a common ground by, for example, joining a confidential meeting with the Senate to exchange information. However, there was an attempt to change the format of the assembly into allegation that the Government was seeking benefits in the sea area. The Prime Minister said that it was only the differences on how we should resolve the problem.

On how the Government could bring back the commitment to the MoU as the situation had escalated, the Prime Minister said that if we did not pull back to the MoU, the situation would become more serious. However, engaging a third country without any guarantee could bring about problems. Indonesia and ASEAN had confirmed that the issue should be dealt bilaterally, but both sides still lacked trust in each other so Indonesia wanted to help facilitate a talk. However, the Prime Minister said that the meeting of the ASEAN Foreign Ministers on 22 February 2011 would have the same spirit. The role of the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Indonesia, as Chairman of ASEAN, in this framework did not bother Thailand.

The Prime Minister expected that the outcome of the meeting with the UNSC would be negotiations among the two countries and ASEAN could help to coordinate and facilitate the talk. However, the process of ASEAN had not reached the stage of applying the ASEAN Charter. The process now was to coordinate and facilitate both countries to continue bilateral negotiations.

The Prime Minister said about the latest positions of Cambodia that, Cambodia had to try to demonstrate that bilateral talks did not work, to lead to international involvement. However, if we explained the facts and adhered to ASEAN’s position, Cambodia should agree to accept it as other parties also supported bilateral negotiations. Nevertheless, we also had prepared to cope with different situations. On the issue that Cambodia had been supported by other countries, the Prime Minister said that we should not see it in that way as positions of different countries depended on information that they received.

The Prime Minister said that we also had to be careful of provocation in the border area as aggressive actions would contribute to multilateral involvement.