Thailand declares curfew along coast as border clashes with Cambodia enter second week

Across the border in Thailand’s Surin province, music teacher Watthanachai Kamngam, 38, told AFP he watched several rockets trail across the dark, early morning sky on Sunday before hearing explosions in the distance.

Watthanachai has been painting colourful scenes of tanks, Thai flags and soldiers carrying the wounded on the walls of concrete bunkers since the July clashes which killed dozens.

“As I live through the fighting, I just want to record this moment – to show that this is really our reality,” he told AFP last week.

The United States, China and Malaysia, as chair of the regional bloc ASEAN, brokered a ceasefire in July.

In October, Trump backed a follow-on joint declaration between Thailand and Cambodia, touting new trade deals after they agreed to prolong their truce.

But Thailand suspended the agreement the following month after Thai soldiers were wounded by landmines at the border.

Trump last week pledged he would “make a couple of phone calls” to get the earlier brokered truce back on track.

But Thai Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul told journalists on Saturday that Trump “didn’t mention whether we should make a ceasefire” during their Friday phone call.

Anutin said there were “no signs” Trump would connect further US-Thailand trade talks with the border conflict, but also said the US president had guaranteed Thailand would get “better benefits than other countries”.

In a statement on Saturday, Malaysia Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said that he had called on both countries to cease cross-border hostilities by 10pm local time on Saturday, with an ASEAN observer team to monitor the truce on the ground.

Anutin on Saturday evening reiterated that no ceasefire had been reached with Cambodia, saying that it is “likely a misunderstanding”, reported Bangkok Post. 

Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet, in a statement on Saturday on Facebook, had said that he welcomed the proposal by Anwar.