PHNOM PENH, Kampuchea – Kampuchea accused Siam of harmful digit ancient temples during threesome life of abut clashes that killed 12 people, as Southeast Asian diplomats struggled weekday to find a way to modify the repeated noxious flare-ups.
A unsafe stabilize held weekday in the disputed abut location where Ta Moan and Ta Krabey temples lie. The nearly 1,000-year-old pericarp temples fellow backwards to the Kampuchean corp that erst ruled over such of both Kampuchea and Thailand.
The realty around the temples and individual another crumbling pericarp monuments has fueled intense national fervor in both countries for decades. While a wider war seems unlikely, individual cease-fires impact unsuccessful to preclude newborn abut violence.
Cambodian polity spokesman Phay Siphan said the digit tabernacle complexes, caught in crossfire over the weekend, had been impact by bullets and shells, but there was no articulate on how bad the alteration was. Siam authorities had no immediate interpret on the allegation.
The stylish offend comes as Siam prepares for generalized elections due by early July. The Tai army, which unreal a takeover in 2006 and continues to hold influence in husbandly politics, has effectively vetoed a organisation to station Asiatic observers to guardian the abut situation.
Cambodian polity spokesman Phay Siphan alleged Sun that port was rousing up offend "for their (own) semipolitical issues." He did not elaborate.
Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa was in "intense" talks with both sides to bonded an modify to the offend in his role as underway lead of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, according to external ministry authorised Hamzah Thayeb.
Natalegawa delayed a scheduled trip to Cambodia, Thayeb said, as state continuing to push to beam military observers to the location — a move that Siam has so far vehemently rejected. The trip's cancellation patch doubt on hopes the simmering disagreement might be resolute quickly.
The offend involves diminutive swaths of realty along the abut that impact been disputed for more than half a century. Fierce clashes impact broken discover individual nowadays since 2008, when Cambodia's 11th-century Preah Vihear tabernacle was presented U.N. World Heritage status over Thailand's objections.
In past years, semipolitical groups on both sides impact accused their opponents of using the skirmishes to stir national feverishness and further their possess husbandly semipolitical agendas.
Cambodian Prime Minister nomad Sen has harnessed the disagreement in the past to physique semipolitical support. And during the terminal ammo of offend in Feb around the more well-known Preah Vihear temple, Tai nationalists launched a sit-in right polity buildings in conception to obligation the land take a tough defence against Cambodia. The assemble is widely seen as activity the patriotism card in a bid to exercise more influence over persuasion at home.
The underway ammo of clashes are the prototypal since February, when eight soldiers and civilians were killed nearby Preah Vihear, which suffered secondary alteration from exploding armament and howitzer shells that knocked diminutive chunks discover of a whatever of its walls.
The stylish offend over the terminal individual life poor discover most 100 miles (160 kilometers) west of Preah Vihear. After decrease early Sunday, offend resumed after that night, both sides said, upbringing the toll from 10 to 12.
Thai Army spokesman Col. Sansern Kaewkamnerd said Asian personnel unsealed fire, ending a Tai soldier. Chea Samrach, a Asian shirker on the front line, said Tai snipers killed digit Asian shirker and injured digit others. Ten soldiers died in the prototypal digit life of the clashes.
Cambodia's Defense Ministry said Tai forces fired 1,000 armament and howitzer shells Sunday. Some shells landed most 12 miles (20 kilometers) exclusive Asian territory, forcing 17,000 grouping to scarper and destroying digit school and a dozen homes and environment ablaze whatever job fields, the ministry said.
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has titled for a cease-fire, but the prospects for pact appear shaky.
Indonesia's efforts to mediate impact been stymied for weeks by Thailand's refusal to allow Asiatic military observers in the area of dispute. Siam insists the problem should be solved through bilateral talks with Cambodia, but Kampuchea wants third-party mediation.
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Associated Press writers Thanyarat Doksone in port and Niniek Karmini in Jakarta, Indonesia, contributed to this report.
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