Foreign ministers of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) gathered for a special meeting in Malaysia on Monday to seek ways to end the conflict between Thailand and Cambodia that reignited earlier, resulting in at least 40 people being killed.
Thailand and Cambodia attended the meeting, after Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim, the regional bloc’s rotating chair this year, said Sunday he had spoken to his Thai and Cambodian counterparts, Anutin Charnvirakul and Hun Manet.
Bangkok suspended a peace accord that it signed in October with Phnom Penh, brokered by Anwar and U.S. President Donald Trump, after several of its soldiers were wounded last month by land mines it claimed were laid by Cambodia.
Anwar said in a statement Sunday that he hopes the special foreign ministerial meeting “serves as an appropriate and constructive platform for both countries to engage in open negotiations, resolve their differences peacefully, and achieve a fair and lasting solution.”
In May, a Cambodian soldier was shot dead by Thai armed forces and ensuing clashes in July killed dozens of people.
The two sides agreed on a cease-fire in late July and signed the expanded peace deal in October. But the intensifying tensions along the border have displaced hundreds of thousands of people.
