Thailand has accused Cambodia of violating a ceasefire agreement reached on Monday, saying clashes continued despite a deal aimed at ending five days of fighting.
Maj General Winthai Suvaree, spokesperson for the Royal Thai Army, said Cambodia had attacked Thai territory “in several places” overnight. He said Thailand regarded this as “a deliberate violation of the agreement, aimed at destroying trust between one another”.
Winthai added that the Thai military had immediately stopped fire at midnight, but that it did respond to Cambodia’s actions.
“I confirm that the Thai side did not use military force to invade, but to prevent encroachment and maintain national sovereignty under international rules,” he said.
Cambodian prime minister Hun Manet said in a Tuesday morning message on Facebook the “frontline has eased since the ceasefire at 12 midnight”.
In Cambodia’s Samraong city – 20 km from the border – an AFP journalist said the sound of blasts stopped in the 30 minutes leading up to midnight, with the lull continuing until dawn.
The two sides had agreed to an “immediate and unconditional” ceasefire on Monday after talks in Malaysia that aimed to halt the worst fighting between the neighbouring countries in more than a decade.
At least 38 people have been killed and more than 300,000 displaced by clashes that erupted on the countries’ shared border on Thursday.
International pressure to end the fighting has grown, with Donald Trump intervening on Saturday, warning that trade negotiations would be paused until the clashes stopped. Thailand and Cambodia face the prospect of a 36% US tariff from 1 August.
Monday’s ceasefire talks were hosted by Malaysia, the current chair of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations regional bloc, and attended by officials from the US and China.
After the ceasefire deal was announced Trump took credit for the development, declaring himself the “President of PEACE” in a post on his social media platform.
However, the Thai authorities warned people who have evacuated from border areas not to return home until further notice, and the news has been met with a mix of hope and some scepticism among affected communities.
The peace deal was set to see military commanders from both sides meet at 7am local time (0000 GMT) but that was delayed until 10am after Thailand accused Cambodia of violating the ceasefire.A cross-border committee is also scheduled to convene in Cambodia to further salve tensions on 4 August.
The Malaysian prime minister, Anwar Ibrahim, who announced the ceasefire agreement on Monday, described it as “a vital first step towards de-escalation and the restoration of peace and security.”
A spokesperson for UN secretary general, António Guterres, said on Monday evening that “he urges both countries to respect the agreement fully and to create an environment conducive to addressing longstanding issues and achieving lasting peace”.
The US state department said its officials had been “on the ground” to shepherd peace talks.
The Cambodian prime minister, Hun Manet, told the media he hoped and “confidently” believed that the outcome of the ceasefire deal would “provide a lot of opportunities”, for hundreds of thousands of people to return to their homes, for the two countries to stop fighting and to rebuild trust and cooperation.
Thailand’s acting prime minister, Phumtham Wechayachai, said the agreement “reflects Thailand’s desire for a peaceful resolution”, adding that his country had agreed to a ceasefire that would “be carried out successfully in good faith by both sides”.
On the eve of the talks, Thailand’s military said Cambodian snipers were camped in one of the contested temples, and accused Phnom Penh of surging troops along the border and hammering Thai territory with rockets, Agence France-Presse reported.
It said there was fighting at seven areas in the rural region, marked by hills surrounded by jungle and fields where locals farm rubber and rice.
With Agence France-Presse
