Abhisit wants to take the land under your house

Photo by: Bloomberg

Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva speaks during a panel discussion at the 2010 World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, in January.

Wednesday, 10 February 2010 15:02 Sam Sok

Dear Editor

It has been more than one year since Pheah Vihear temple was registered by UNESCO as a World Heritage site in Cambodia on July 7, 2008.

Since then, I have been reading different online news in order to learn more about the situation along the Cambodian and Thai border.

While I am struggling to make sense out of the Thai media, the Abhisit government has been using the Bangkok Post to manipulate and confuse the local and international communities in relation to its neighbouring country, Cambodia. In an article titled “Abhisit counters Hun Sen’s claim” on

www.bangkokpost. com, “the Thai government will use Prime Minister Hun Sen’s comment to explain to the World Heritage Committee that the area around Preah Vihear temple clearly belongs to Thailand”, Abhisit was quoted as saying. Such a statement has confused some people who do not know the history of Preah Vihear, especially the verdict by the World Court in 1962 in which Preah Vihear temple was determined to belong to Cambodia.

To make it easy to understand, I am going to translate Abhisit’s statement, and here is what he is trying to explain: The land underneath your house belongs to your neighbour.

Although there are people struggling to make sense out of Abhisit’s statement, I admit that my translation also does not make sense – that is

because what he said was nonsense.

Therefore, in order to clarify the confusion, I am willing to have a direct debate with Abhisit. But first please ask yourself a question: Does the land underneath your house belong to your neighbour? If your answer is a “yes”, let’s open a debate.

Sam Sok

Florida

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