Interesting Article on Border in Bangkok Post

[cavanami]

Sounds like a workable plan!!!

[Gadfly]

Merits aside, I get the sense that Cambodia is outflanking Thailand on this issue. See this from the Bangkok Post:

 

Mr Kasit said Cambodia had launched aggressive acts at the border and now threatened to take the dispute to the International Court of Justice.

 

Cambodia last week petitioned the court to clarify its 1962 ruling to determine which country has sovereignty over land near the temple.

 

The court will hold a hearing on May 30-31.

 

"Threatening" to take the dispute to court. Oh my! In other words, "threatening" to resolve a (i) border skirmish where shots are being fired, lives have been lost and thousands displaced with (ii) a court proceeding?

 

Thailand really doesn't want this going back to the ICJ Court - that's clear. I wonder if my hunch about Thailand's weak legal position is right? If so, the yellow shirts nationalistic stunts have really jeopardized Thai interests in this matter.

 

But did they ever really care about this temple and Thai interests in this area? They don't appear to have thought it through every carefully if they did.

 

[Flashermac]

The land they are squabbling over near the temple ruins is nothing but rocky jungle - not worth one life on either side. Unless the ICJ agrees to reopen the question of the correctness of the border map itself, I don't see what the Thai's argument is going to be. I remember from the Thai newspaper reports that the yellow shirts were very unpopular in the areas. The Thai locals more or less told them to fark off and leave them alone.

 

Still, I think the analysis that Kim Hun Sen has been planning the whole mess to get the ICJ to take action and say the land is his is correct. He is a former Khmer Rouge officer and could care less how many proles must die or suffer for him to get his way. It's a shame the Thais let him draw them into it though. They can thank Chamlong and company for that.

 

p.s. There may be some minor argument about exactly where the line drawn in 1904 is located, but it can hardly include the entire 4.6 km2 area.

 

[Gadfly]

I wonder why the Thai foreign policy experts and the mandarins in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs didn't see this comming? I am certainly no expert in this area, but shouldn't Thailand's experts seen how this was likely going to play out?

 

The current Minister of Foreign Affairs, Krasit, was an avid PAD supporter (not sure of his position now). Was this expediency or did he just get blindsided by the more extreme elements in PAD?

 

If Thailand loses a second round before the ICJ Court, you can be sure PAD will blame the Democrats for losing "Thai land". They won't be saying: "uh, maybe making a big deal out this just gave Cambodia an opportunity to hammer the final nail in the coffin."

[ThaiHome]

Just to clarify a few misunderstandings being bandied about here.

 

The ICJ ruling is final cannot be appealed. There is a 10 year time limit to introduce new evidence. There is no time limit for how long one of the parties can ask for an explanation of the judgment, which is what Cambodia has done.

 

Thailand’s position since the 1962 ruling is that Cambodia only requested and the court ruled on the sovereignty of the temple. Though the judgment said that the Annex I map showed the temple inside Cambodia and Thailand never questioned the map and therefore must have accepted the map as showing the border it did not rule the map was the border. It was not asked to make that ruling and did not. Nor did it choose to say if the map diverged from the watershed that was supposed to be the border. It is a bit of a lawyerly difference that may be a bit subtle for some to appreciate but around that technicality is Thailand’s only case at this point.

 

 

 

The main question now that Cambodia has asked for an explanation is will the court say the judgment does indeed say the border should follows the Annex I map or will it say that is a separate question that must be ruled on separately. Cambodia is hoping for the first which would end the whole thing, Thailand the second which would open the whole map versus watershed discussion.

 

I can see the ICJ saying a new case must be opened if Cambodia wants to have the issue of the border decided. There is little doubt that Cambodia (with ample US support) did not ask the court to decide the border but only the sovereignty of the temple to avoid that issue being brought up. Do they now want the court to decide the border? I doubt it. This could just as easily backfire for Cambodia and Thailand.

 

TH

 

[Flashermac]

Thanks. I wasn't aware the court ruling was only on the temple itself.

 

The ICJ's majority's reasoning is clearly fucked. You know how remote it is out there, and the Thais accepted that the French surveyors had done their duty. This was a century ago - think of what it must have been like getting there! Prince Damrong did meet the French representative there in 1930. But it was not until AFTER this that the Thais discovered the map had not followed the agreed natural watershed. As the court noted, Thailand produced maps in 1934 and 1935 which did reflect the natural watershed - and thus the correct border. The Thais also occupied and controlled the area, as is shown by the Royal Department of Fine Arts visiting the temple and surveying the ruins. There is no record of any Cambodians ever visiting the ruins except perhaps with that one French visit. Still, the court said the Thai government used the incorrect map anyway and thus "accepted" that the site belonged to France (Cambodia). What happened locally was "irrelevant". So despite the Thais being there and controlling the site, they really had agreed that it wasn't theirs? WTF.

 

 

[Pom Michael]

I can see this going badly for Cambodia. Whose to say the that ICJ doesn't go back and redo the entire border again with today's technology and all????

[Flashermac]

 

I honestly don't see them wanting to open that can of worms, and TH says they don't gave that authority.

 

Modern technology did cause the fighting on the Thai-Lao some years back. The Thais checked and found that border markers were in the "wrong" places, so they moved them. They then occupied a couple of tiny villages in what "should have been" Thailand. The PDR Laos government had a fit, demanding the marker be put back where they were and that the Thais withdraw. When the Thai army didn't, Lao soldiers one night attacked the small Thai garrison in a village, routing the defenders and killing a number of them. Chawalit was commander of the Thai army then, and he started throwing the Thai army at entrenched Laotian positions, which meant they suffered heavy casualties. The Thai government finally stepped in and told Chawalit to knock it off.

 

The border is still where the French put the markers up there, not where satellite positioning says it maybe should be - a similiar situation to the Cambodian border.

 

I met a Lao who told me he'd been in the army then and had fought against the Thais. He said he felt very bad about it, since the jungle they were arguing over wasn't worth anyone dying for. Plus the men he was shooting like as not were his Lao speaaking cousins from Issan.

 

 

[Gadfly]

Hmmm... I am all in favor of Thailand here and I will certainly keep an open mind, but I am baffled by some of your statements. For example, you say:

 

The ICJ ruling is final cannot be appealed. There is a 10 year time limit to introduce new evidence.

 

What is the point of introducing new evidence if the ICJ ruling is final? If it’s final it cannot be changed. If it can be changed through the introduction of new evidence it’s not final.

 

You describe the ICJ judgment as follows:

 

Though the judgment said that the Annex I map showed the temple inside Cambodia and Thailand never questioned the map and therefore must have accepted the map as showing the border it did not rule the map was the border. It was not asked to make that ruling and did not. Nor did it choose to say if the map diverged from the watershed that was supposed to be the border.

 

The ICJ itself describes its judgment as follows:

 

From these facts, the court concluded that Thailand had accepted the Annex I map. Even if there were any doubt in this connection, Thailand was not precluded from asserting that she had not accepted it since France and Cambodia had relied upon her acceptance and she had for fifty years enjoyed such benefits as the Treaty of 1904 has conferred on her. Furthermore, the acceptance of the Annex I map caused it to enter the treaty settlement; the Parties had at that time adopted an interpretation of that settlement which caused the map line to prevail over the provisions of the Treaty and, as there was no reason to think that the Parties had attached any special importance to the line of the watershed as such, as compared with the overriding importance of a final regulation of their own frontiers, the Court considered that the interpretation to be given now would be the same.

 

The Court therefore felt bound to pronounce in favour of the frontier indicated on the Annex I map in the disputed area

 

It’s a mouthful, but let’s focus on the two statements at the beginning of each paragraph: “From these facts, the court concluded that Thailand had accepted the Annex I mapâ€. And then: “The court therefore felt found to pronounce in favor of the frontier indicated on the Annex 1 Map.â€

 

Is the ICJ own description of its own judgment wrong? The ICJ’s description of the judgment seems to differ from your description. Can you explain?

 

Cambodia is pressing for an ICJ case to clarify the judgment, and Thailand opposes a new case. Now if your analysis of the ICJ judgment is correct I would expect it to be the other way around. Thailand would be pressing for a clarifying judgment and Cambodia would be in opposition to an ICJ case.

 

Why would Thailand oppose a new case to clarify the judgment if it had nothing to fear from such a case? Why would Cambodia press for such a case if the original judgment did not – as set out in the quoted description of the judgment from the ICJ itself – support its position?

 

I am certainly no expert in this area and I am keeping an open mind about this, but I need to see some references to sources and consistent arguments to be persuaded. Can you provide them?

[Gadfly]

The ICJ's majority's reasoning is clearly fucked.

 

Incidentally, I don't disagree with this. I am struggling with linking (a) the ICJ's description of its own judgment on its own website (I provide the link and quote above) with ( TH's description of that judgment? Am I missing something here? If so, explain it me so I can understand, since everyone I know here (Thailand) agrees with Flashermac that the ICJ's majority's reasoning is wrong, but also concedes that it favors Cambodia. I have never heard anyone say the ICJ judgment favors Thailand, but if it does, I am all ears.