Phay Siphan: The Preah Vihear issued with Thailand is merely a technical issue ... it is not a dispute between nations -sic!-

Phay Siphan: International resolution of the Preah Vihear dispute is the destruction of Hun Xen’s concluded 2000 MOU

Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Everyday.com.kh
Translated from Khmer by Socheata

Phay Siphan, spokesman of the Council of Ministers, said that the resolution of the Preah Vihear temple dispute with Thailand through an international court is tantamount to the destruction of the 2000 Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) [KI-Media note: the 2000 MOU was concluded between Hun Sen’s government and Thailand]. Phay Siphan told The Phnom Penh Post regarding the opposition wanting the government to bring this dispute issue to be resolved by an international court, that: “This is the freedom of the opposition. Up to now, we do not consider the Preah Vihear temple dispute as a dispute between nations. We consider the Preah Vihear temple dispute as a separate issue because we have prepared 70% of the map from Anlong Veng down to the Cham Yeam point already.” He added: “Therefore, if we take this dispute to resolve outside [of the bilateral discussion with Thailand], this means that we are destroying the 2000 achievement. Therefore, the opposition party should revisit what was the gain from the 2000 MOU to the good cooperation between Cambodia and Thailand, in the sense of preserving peace, in the sense of the application of what we have agreed on since 1904 and 1907 and the map preparation in 1908. Do we want to sue each other to come up with a new map? In summary, the Preah Vihear issue is merely a technical issue, i.e. it is not a political affair.”
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KI-Media note: Phay Siphan seems to forget that the 2000 MOU did not stop Thailand from invading part of Cambodia. How many more Cambodian soldiers need to be killed for Phay Siphan to acknowledge this fact? As is, Thailand is also questioning the validity of all the treaties it concluded in 1904 and 1907.

Samak: Khmer troops invade Thai soil; Hun Sen's 2000 border treaty concession with Thailand comes back to haunt him

Thai troops are in Thai territory : Thai PM

Fri, July 18, 2008
By Supalak Ganjanakhundee
The Nation

It is Cambodian troops who invade in our soil

Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej insisted on Friday that the Thai troops can station at Keo Sikha Kiri Svara Pagoda because it is in the Thai soil.

In his reply letter to his Cambodian counterpart Hun Sen, Samak stressed that presence of the Cambodian troops at the area instead violated the Thai territory.

Samak reminded Hun Sen, "the establishment of the Cambodian community, including construction of a temple and houses, and the presence of the Cambodian military personnel in the area constitute a continued violation of Thai sovereignty and territorial integrity."

Hun Sen said in his letter sent to Samak on Thursday that Thai troops deployed to the pagoda's area should be immediately withdrawn as the area is in the Cambodian soil.

The Thai government has issued four written protests to the Cambodian side regarding this matter in 2004, 2005, 2007 and April 2008 respectively.

Meanwhile, the deployment by Cambodia of more than 1,000 troops, in addition to around 200 troops stationed there earlier, has caused the situation to deteriorate, Samak said in his letter.

Prime Minister Samak called on both sides to exercise restraint and hoped that the Thai-Cambodian Joint Boundary Commission will accelerate its work to survey and demarcate the entire stretch of the Thai-Cambodian border so that similar problems would not arise in the future.

In addition, pending completion of the JBC's work in this area, the Thai side was ready to jointly explore with Cambodia possible interim measures, he said.

To avoid military action, Prime Minister Samak who is also the Defense Minister assigned Supreme Commander General Boonsarng Niumpradit to lead Thai delegation to a special session of General Border Committee (GBC) in Sa Kaew Monday.

Later on Friday, the Foreign Ministry invited the eight other ASEAN Ambassadors to the ministry and informed them of the situation between Thailand and Cambodia, which are Asean members.

They were also given copies of the letter dated July 17, 2008 from Hun Sen to Samak and the latter's note dated July 18,2008 to his Cambodian counterpart.

Other documents attached included the attached copies of the four Aide-Memoires which Thailand sent to protest Cambodia, and copies of the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the two countries on the Survey and Demarcation of Land Boundary dated 4 June 2000.

The ministry has also circulated all of those documents to other foreign missions in Bangkok.

Meanwhile Thai Foreign Ministry's Spokesman Tharit Charungvat explained that the four protests by Thailand to Cambodia were made on the basis of Article 5 of the 2000 MOU, under which both sides agree not to carry out any work resulting in changes of environment of the frontier zone, pending the survey and demarcation of the common land boundary.

However, to date, no action whatsoever has been undertaken by Cambodia to address Thailand's concerns, protests and requests.