Preah Vihear dilemma demands more than military skills

However, feelings could heat up if the power arrangement in Bangkok cannot be settled smoothly.

There are two major hot spots in the boundary issue Thailand needs to settle with Cambodia. The first is the area adjacent to the Hindu temple of Preah Vihear; and the second is “overlapping areas” claimed by both sides in the Gulf of Thailand.

The area near Preah Vihear – which we’ll focus on here – is a crucial portion of the nearly 800-kilometre-long land boundary, since it has not been demarcated and is an historic point of discord between the two countries.

Much would go smoothly in national ties if they could get over the Preah Vihear conflict together.

This territorial dispute dates back to 1954 when Thailand occupied the temple of Preah Vihear. Bilateral negotiations to return to the status quo failed and Phnom Penh took the case to the world court, which ruled in 1962 that the temple was situated in territory under the sovereignty of Cambodia.

A decade ago, Thailand and Cambodia reached an idea to list Preah Vihear temple as a world heritage site; that would be perfect for tourism in the border area of the two countries. 

But the cooperation turned into conflict when nationalists in Thailand accused their governments of relinquishing Thai rights over the temple to Cambodia. This marked the beginning of chronic conflict, and later, military clashes.

It is important to note that all key people in the current government, as well as the junta’s members and supporters, have had their hands muddied in the conflict with Cambodia over Preah Vihear since 2008.

Thai nationalists, as well as the military, accepted the fact that the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled in favour of Phnom Penh and established the sandstone ruin as belonging to Cambodia; but they kept arguing that the vicinity of the temple was under Thai sovereignty in accordance with the Siam-Franco treaties of 1904 and 1907. In November 2013, the court reinterpreted its 1962 verdict, as requested by Cambodia, that the whole promontory of the mountain with the same name as the temple belonged to Cambodia.

This time the court clearly defined the promontory, but the area northeast of the temple remained unclear as the court told the conflicting parties to refer to the French-made map. The ICJ told the two countries to cooperate “in good faith” to define and delineate the border in that area. The previous Thai government set up committees to interpret the court’s 2013 verdict and work with Cambodia on how to define the area in question. But they did not finish the job before the May 22 military coup, which changed the political situation in Thailand again.

The task is now in the hands of Deputy PM Prawit Wongsuwan, who was commissioned to take care of the boundary issue with neighbouring Cambodia. Prawit is the right man to do the job as he was among the nationalists responsible for the territorial conflict with Cambodia in 2008. 

And as defence minister, he was in charge when Thailand and Cambodia had a border skirmish near Preah Vihear in 2011.

Prawit could not shift the blame to anybody for the ICJ’s verdict – which in the majority of Thai perception is in favour of Cambodia. Phnom Penh presented the case for an interpretation in April 2011, as the result of the military clash a few months earlier. The incident, in fact, was an expensive lesson for Prawit and nationalist groups that military means will never settle a boundary conflict. Instead, it created more trouble.

Like it or not, he badly needed to come together with his Cambodian counterpart, who is keen to define the boundary in the area of Preah Vihear in line with the ICJ’s verdict.

Prawit’s military background might be helpful – but not that much – since boundary negotiation requires skill in diplomatic, legal and historical matters.