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Cambodia-Thailand Border Clashes Enter Second Week

Dec 14, Kathmandu - A new border clash between Cambodia and Thailand entered its second week on Sunday. US President Donald Trump said a ceasefire had been agreed to end the deadly fighting, but the Thai prime minister denied it, saying the fighting was continuing.

Officials say the ongoing conflict, which is due to a border dispute along the 800km (500 miles) long colonial-era border, has displaced about 800,000 people. “I feel sad that the fighting is going on. I have been here for six days,” Sin Leap, 63, told AFP on Sunday at a relief center in Cambodia’s border province of Banteay Meanchey.

“I want the fighting to stop,” he said, worried about his home and livestock. At least 25 people have been killed in the attacks, including 14 Thai soldiers and 11 Cambodian civilians. Both sides have claimed that the other has provoked clashes, attacked civilians, and is fighting in self-defense.

Trump, who has previously supported a ceasefire and further agreements, said on Friday that the Southeast Asian neighbors had agreed to stop fighting. Thai leaders have said there was no ceasefire agreement and both governments said fighting was continuing on Sunday morning. Thai Defense Ministry spokesman Surasant Kongsiri said Cambodia had bombed several border provinces since Saturday night.

Spokesperson Kongsiri said Cambodia also carried out bombing and shelling in several border provinces on Sunday. Similarly, Cambodian Defense Ministry spokesman Mali Sochita said Thailand had continued to fire mortars and bombs at the border since midnight. Cambodia closed its border with Thailand on Saturday after the ceasefire agreement promised by Trump was not fulfilled.

Refugee Chev Sokun, who lives in a makeshift tent at a relief camp in Banteay Meanchey, Cambodia, told AFP that her husband in Thailand wanted to return home. Sokun and his son fled Thailand along with tens of thousands of other Cambodian migrant workers during deadly clashes in July, but his wife stayed behind to work as a gardener with her “cooperative Thai owner.”

“There were several rockets flying in the dark sky early Sunday morning,” Wattanachai Kamangam, a 38-year-old music teacher across the province’s border, told AFP. The Thai military has imposed an overnight curfew from 7 p.m. to 5 a.m. in parts of Sa Kaeo and Trat provinces amid the fighting. The United States, China and Malaysia, as the chair of the regional grouping ASEAN, brokered a ceasefire in July.

Trump announced a new trade deal in October after agreeing to extend a ceasefire in support of a joint declaration between Thailand and Cambodia, but Thailand suspended the deal the following month after Thai soldiers were injured by landmines on the border.

Trump last week pledged to make “some phone calls” to get the ceasefire back on track. Thai Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul said in a phone call on Saturday that Trump had not mentioned whether he would call a ceasefire. Anutin said there was no indication that Trump was linking U.S.-Thailand trade talks to the border conflict.