Cambodia and Thailand take their 27,000 square kilometre Gulf of Thailand dispute to UN conciliation in Singapore
Cambodia and Thailand appear this week before a five-member conciliation commission at the Permanent Court of Arbitration's Singapore office over some 27,000 square kilometres of overlapping claims in the Gulf of Thailand, with Foreign Ministers Prak Sokhonn and Sihasak Phuangketkeow due to give opening statements on Tuesday. Phnom Penh started the UN-backed process after Bangkok withdrew unilaterally in May from MoU 44, the 2001 memorandum under which the two countries had negotiated joint offshore energy development for more than two decades.
Geopolitics··Midday
Delegations in Singapore for a first meeting running from 14 to 16 September
Cambodia's Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Prak Sokhonn led his delegation and legal team into Singapore on Sunday morning for the first meeting of a conciliation commission constituted under Annex V of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), which runs from 14 to 16 September. Prak Sokhonn sits as Cambodia's agent with Lam Chea, the minister in charge of border affairs, as deputy agent; Thailand's Foreign Minister Sihasak Phuangketkeow acts as agent with Ambassador Songchai Chaipatiyut as deputy, and Bangkok has announced specialists from the Royal Thai Navy's Hydrographic and Naval Operations departments and the energy ministry's Department of Mineral Fuels. Opening statements by both sides are scheduled for 15 September at 9 a.m. Singapore time, open to the public and webcast in Khmer, English and Thai. The commission's recommendations are not binding and are expected to take about a year; the Permanent Court of Arbitration, set up in 1899, runs its Singapore office as its first in Asia.[2], [1]
MoU 44 and a 300 billion dollar overlapping claims area
The 2001 memorandum known as MoU 44 was the framework under which the two countries negotiated joint offshore energy development for more than two decades, and the only bilateral framework they had. Bangkok withdrew from it unilaterally in May, saying no progress had been made, and Phnom Penh answered four months later with the UN-backed conciliation, with part of the kingdom's energy future at stake. Thailand's energy ministry has estimated future oil and gas revenues from the roughly 27,000 square kilometres of overlapping claims at around 300 billion dollars. Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul denied that the withdrawal was linked to the border conflict that erupted into two rounds of clashes last year, in which dozens were killed and more than a million people were displaced before a truce.[1], [2]
A milestone for Phnom Penh, a promise of full cooperation from Bangkok
Cambodia's foreign ministry described the meeting as another important milestone in the peaceful process that Cambodia initiated, and Prime Minister Hun Manet said in June that the step was meant to protect Cambodia's sovereignty and maritime rights in accordance with international law. Thailand's foreign ministry said it was ready to cooperate fully with the commission while safeguarding its national interests. William Jones of Mahidol University wrote in The Diplomat that the withdrawal was meant to tell Thai voters that the legacy of Thaksin Shinawatra, the prime minister under whom the 2001 memorandum was drafted, was over, and that Cambodia's case was a low-cost legal avenue after its defeat on the land border.[1]
