Thailand–Cambodia Conflict Escalates | Airstrikes & Diplomatic Tensions Rise

F-16s of Thailand have bombed Phnom Penh in Cambodia; a brewing border dispute and diplomatic breakdown boiled quickly into furious exchanges over bombs and artillery that left at least 11 civilians as well as a soldier dead in Thailand.

The fresh dose of violence that broke on Thursday in the morning in the border zone between Thailand and Cambodia in northwestern Oddar Meanchey province was blamed by both countries.

The Thai military official Rear Admiral Surasant Kongsiri said that fighting then broke out in at least six locations along the border. This prompted Thailand military to seal the borders between the two countries.

With neighbors clamoring to mediate, Thailand caretaker Prime Minister Phumtham Wechayachai said at a news conference: You have to stop fighting then you can have negotiation. He answered there had been no declaration of war, and that the hostilities were not extending to other provinces.

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The health minister of Thailand Somsak Thepsuthin reported an 11 civilian including an eight-yrs boy and a soldier had been assassinated in artillery shelling by the Cambodian side. According to him, 24 civilians and seven military soldiers were injured.

According to Somsak, he told the reporters that the actions of Cambodia, such as an attack on hospital and others are a war crime.

The Thai military said in a statement that six civilians were killed and two wounded in shelling in a petrol station in the area of Ban Phue in Kantharalak district in Sisaket province, around 20km (12 miles) north of the border.

Two civilians, one of them being the eight-year-old, who were killed by an attack near Ban Chorok area, Kabcheing district, Surin province, wounded two others. The statement said one was wounded, another person killed in Ubon Ratchathani province, in a district named Nam Yuen.

Fighting between them has been sending at least 40,000 civilians out of 86 villages along the border to safer grounds, a district official in the province of Surin told the Reuters news agency, as villagers flock to bomb shelters made of concrete and stacked with sandbags and car tires.

Neither of the sides has reported any casualties in the case of Cambodia.

In her reaction to the violence, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet has requested the urgency of the United Nations Security Council saying that the violence is a monumental threat to regional peace.

Both the parties exchange blame

The two countries released statements that blame each other of initiating the fighting that broke out early on Thursday morning, close to a controversial temple, after weeks of heightened tension between the neighbours.

The Thai military stated that around the early morning of Thursday, Cambodia had already launched a surveillance drone followed by sending troops to the scene which they said had fired heavy weaponry such as artillery and long range BM21 rocket provoking the Thai soldiers to fight back.

Thai military was ready to send six F-16 fighters to conflict along the Thai-Cambodia border and their attack had struck two objectives and as far as the Thai military deputy spokesperson Ritcha Suksuwanon claimed, these attacks had struck the 2 targets on the Cambodian ground that were aimed as targets by the F-16s.

With events worsening by the hour, Cambodian armies attacked civilian zones in Thailand including a hospital killing people, according to the Thai Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The ministry of national defence of Cambodia stated that the Thai fighter jets deposited two bombs on a road, and it quoted that it strongly denounces this irresponsible and brutal military aggression of the kingdom of Thailand against the national sovereignty and territorial integrity of Cambodia.

The Cambodian ministry also chastised Thailand of launching the first strike and breaking an olympiad supposed to cool down the tension, saying that its forces had been on the self defence after being ambushed by Thailand.

In a social media post, Cambodia influential former prime minister, Hun Sen, claimed that Thailand military had shelled two Cambodian provinces bordering Thailand, Oddar Meanchey and Preah Vihear and that the Cambodian army did not have any other option than to fight and defend themselves.

He also enacted the people not to panic buy food supply.

Thailand has declared school shutdown in its parts, with Cambodia also stating that it has taken students and teachers out of the affected areas.

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Malaysian prime minister: Stand down

Other Asian nations have come out to express concerns over the exchanges and have demanded that the violence be stopped.

Malaysian prime minister Anwar Ibrahim who is also the current chair of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) where Thailand and Cambodia are members urged calm and said he would also talk to leaders of the two nations later on Thursday evening to urge resolution in a peaceful manner.

China also voiced its anxiety over the situation as its foreign ministry spokesperson, Guo Jiaku, during a briefing pointed out that Beijing seriously concerns itself with the situation and wished that both sides resolved their concerns through talks. China was going to play a positive role in ensuring de-escalation, he said.

High levels of tension ‘erupted’

Al Jazeera Koh Lanta, southern Thailand, Tony Cheng said the dispute “has been simmering for some time, but it seems to have exploded today”.

“There was a feeling up until today that this was a game of pressure, waiting to see who would crack first,” he said. “We hadn’t seen a lot of actual exchanges of fire over the border – but today, that all changed.”

According to him, the conflict was aggravated by the fact that the border between the two nations which the French had drawn during the colonial period in Cambodia was a source of consistent clash as regions where people had been moving freely forward and backward in generations rather freely were separated by the French.

It has been going on decades and has erupted into fatal military attacks more than a decade ago and again last month as one soldier (Cambodian) lost his life in a gunfight further north of the combat zones.

Tensions have flared once more in recent weeks following the harsh injury of the Thai soldiers by landmines that the Thai army claims were just planted by the Cambodian forces across the Thai boundary. In the meantime, Cambodia said that it will start concripting the military starting the new year.

Cheng stated that nationalistic impulse was rising on both ends and Hun Sen, who was the former Cambodian Prime Minister, was father of the incumbent Prime Minister, was at the center of fanning flames on the dispute in his nation.

Thailand, Cambodia reduce their diplomatic relations

Since over a hundred years, Thailand and Cambodia have been in dispute of sovereignty along some undemarcated areas of their land boundary, which measures 817km (508-miles).

The most recent fighting erupted once after Thailand late Wednesday recalled its ambassador to Cambodia and said it would expel the Cambodian representative in Thai capital Bangkok have accused Cambodia of landmines, which one lost the leg of a Thai soldier, in a week. Cambodia responded by saying that Cambodia intends to pull its diplomats out of Thailand and issued a total expulsion of Thai diplomats.

Cambodia has accused Thais of laying mines and Thais have insisted that their soldiers have gone in different directions agreed upon and stepped on mines that had been laid during the Cambodia civil war.

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