The Preah Vihear saga

May 14, 2008
Courtesy of Cambodia: Details are Sketchy

Thailand continues to act like a petulant teenager over Preah Vihear.

Thailand may ask Unesco to again postpone its decision on the registration of the ancient ruins at Preah Vihear as a World Heritage site this year if it is unable to convince Cambodia to settle the land dispute through joint management, Foreign Minister Noppadon Pattama said yesterday.

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Cambodian Commerce Minister Cham Prasidh criticised the move by Thailand to link the Preah Vihear issue to the overlapping areas for offshore oil exploration.

”If we solve the Preah Vihear case, then we also solve the overlapping zone offshore. They’re completely different things, the minister told the Cambodia Daily newspaper.

There’s really no other way to put it: linking Preah Vihear negotiations to overlapping oilfield claims is blackmail. That Unesco is playing along in such pedantic Thai games is shameful. Preah Vihear temple belongs unquestionably to Cambodia. The listing of Preah Vihear as a World Heritage Site, too, belongs unquestionably to Cambodia. Thailand has zero to do with it.

But Cambodia need not wait at the mercy of an irrational and arrogant Thailand. If there’s anything that Hun Sen’s CPP-lead government does well, it’s play the game of global politics like an Ouk Chaktrung board: the Japanese and their bloodlust for killing whales, the Americans and their murderous War on Terror, the Chinese and their One China policy, those insane monsters in Myanmar — Cambodia unflinchingly supported them all.

It’s time to call in the markers. With an A-list of heavy political hitters behind it, Cambodia should easily be able to quash Thai opposition to the listing of Preah Vihear as a World Heritage Site. Without the listing, Preah Vihear is likely to remain an obscure destination. With it, Preah Vihear would skyrocket in importance as a tourist destination, rivaling Angkor Wat virtually overnight.

That’s why Thailand wants so badly to be at the table. There’s a ton of money at stake, and the odds that Thailand will see a dime of it grow slimmer every day. Their continued interference in Cambodia’s Unesco request all but guarantees it.