BANGKOK, Nov. 10 (AP) - (Kyodo)—The Thai Cabinet approved Tuesday ending talks with Cambodia on their disputed maritime border to protest Phnom Penh's appointment of ousted Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra as an economic adviser, Thailand's deputy government spokesman said.
The approval came the same day as Thaksin arrived in Cambodia to meet Prime Minister Hun Sen and give an economic lecture to more than 300 Cambodian economists later in the week.
According to Supachai Chaisamut, the Cabinet approved in principle terminating a memorandum of understanding with Cambodia on maritime boundary negotiations that was signed before Thaksin was overthrown by military coup while he was out of the country.
Supachai said that because Thaksin knows the background and Thailand's negotiating strategies regarding the understanding, his offering advice to Cambodia could be to Thailand's disadvantage.
The actual end of the agreement, however, will not come until Parliament also agrees to the abrogation.
The spokesman said Thailand is also ready to ask Cambodia to hand Thaksin over immediately if the Foreign Ministry confirms Thaksin's address in Cambodia.
He admitted, however, it is up to the Cambodian courts to decide if Thaksin should be extradited.
Thaksin was ousted as Thai prime minister in 2006 and has since been convicted of conflict of interest while in power and sentenced in absentia to two years in prison.
But Cambodia believes the charges against Thaksin, and his sentence, were politically motivated, making the 1998 extradition treaty between the two countries inapplicable.
Ties between Cambodia and Thailand have deteriorated since Thaksin's ouster, with armed forces from both sides skirmishing along disputed areas of land border, particularly near a Cambodian temple that Thailand had long claimed, that has been made a World Heritage site.
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