The rattling of sabres

With headlines like this Cambodia on brink of war with Thailand and this Cambodia asks UN to intervene in 'imminent state of war' with Thailand people are a little nervous. Add to this the upcoming election and tensions are running high.

UNESCO designated Preah Vihear as a World Heritage Site earlier this month and a land dispute has arisen. Mix in Thai and Cambodian soldiers and the situation has escalated with neither side willing to lose face or surrender what they consider theirs. KI-Media has more details.

The problem dates back to a map drawn up in 1908 by French cartographers to define the Thai-Cambodian border when Cambodia was still a French colony. Although the French insisted the border should be defined according to the watershed - where the rain water falls in opposite directions - along the Dongrak mountain range, in their map the ancient Preah Vihear, perched on the tip of a 525 metre high cliff that is a steep fall on the Cambodian side and a gradual slope on the Thai one, oddly ended up on the Cambodian side of the watershed.

Thailand's failure to officially object to the questionable map-making led to their losing the temple in 1962 when a dispute over the temple's ownership was settled in the Hague at the International Court of Justice.

The court ruling, while in Cambodia's favour, left the dispute over the actual border line open to further discussion.

Thailand still claims that a 4.6-square-kilometre plot of land adjacent to the temple is still subject to this dispute.

Cambodia has asked the UN Security Council to intervene. And the SG has called for restraint and a peaceful resolution. The SC is going to decide whether to convene a special emergency session tomorrow.

There is a call for a boycott of Thai goods and residents of Poipet (which borders Thailand) are stocking up on necessities in case the border is closed

A Cambodian villager who crossed the border and bought food supplies said Cambodians in Poi Pet feared that fighting could break out.

He said Poi Pet residents believed that negotiations between the two neighbours' military leaders, scheduled for Monday and aimed at defusing the tensions, would be fruitless after Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen had demanded that Thailand withdraw its troops.

Cambodians believe that Thailand would not follow the Cambodian leader's request, said the villager.

The SG decision tomorrow many resolve some of the issues. People are afraid of war but embassies haven't issued any particular advice and tourists are still visiting the temples. 'Wait and see' is the policy.