Thailand hits back after Hun Sen brands border actions ‘discredit warfare’
Thailand has pushed back at Hun Sen after the Cambodian Senate President accused it of waging a new kind of war along their disputed border.
Hun Sen spoke at the second Inter-Parliamentary Speakers’ Conference in Phnom Penh on Wednesday. He described Thailand’s border actions as “discredit warfare,” a modern tactic that he said exploits a neighbour’s internal weaknesses. The aim, in his telling, is to pressure the government and damage its standing abroad.
His central charge was that Thailand has used allegations about online scam operations as cover for taking Cambodian land. He said the border war was “part of this situation.” Thailand was occupying Cambodian territory, he added, “on the grounds that some parts of our territory are associated with online scams.”
Hun Sen listed a series of specific complaints. He accused Thailand of installing barbed wire and shipping containers inside Cambodian territory. He also alleged it had built infrastructure before the border was formally demarcated, and handed plots in disputed zones to Thai civilians. He singled out the area around O’Smach in Oddar Meanchey province as occupied land.
He framed international criticism of Cambodia’s human rights record as part of the same campaign. He referenced the US-sanctioned senator Ly Yong Phat and his links to scam compounds in border zones.
The remarks land against a heavy backdrop. More than 100 people died in fighting along the frontier last year. Over 20,000 Cambodians were displaced from villages that Phnom Penh says remain under Thai control.
Thailand answered the following day. Air Chief Marshal Prapas Sonjaidee directs the Joint Information Centre on the Thailand-Cambodia Situation. He rejected the war framing outright, and said the sequence of events matters.
“If we are going to talk about war, we must start with the first shot, not the day Thailand responded,” he said on Friday.
Prapas also drew a distinction, he said Hun Sen had collapsed. Targeting sites tied to scam networks is one thing, he argued. Using those same sites for military purposes is another, and the two should not be treated as the same act.
On the occupation claim, he said holding troop positions under a ceasefire is not the same as seizing territory. Where the border actually runs should be settled through the bilateral border mechanisms, he added, not by whichever army is standing on the ground.
He said Thailand’s position remains focused on protecting civilians on both sides. He also pointed to Cambodian weapons that he said had struck Thai civilian areas.
Neither side has signalled a return to formal talks. That leaves the ceasefire in place, but the underlying dispute unresolved.
Related news
- Thai-Cambodian border tensions persist despite ceasefire
- Thai Cambodian border dispute: army reaffirms sovereignty
- Thai man swims across Thai-Cambodian border after scam operation escape
