Thailand launches airstrikes as tensions with Cambodia erupt in deadly border clashes

Monthslong tensions between Thailand and Cambodia erupted into deadly armed clashes on Thursday as the two sides attacked each other with fighter planes, rockets, and artillery, as soldiers clashed on the ground along the disputed border.

The Thai military said that F-16 fighter planes carried out airstrikes on two military targets in Cambodia. It said that six fighter planes hit two “Cambodian military targets on the ground”.

The airstrikes came after the Thai Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) said that Cambodian artillery shelling hit a house in the early hours of the day and killed at least one Thai civilian and injured three others, including a five-year-old child.

Tensions had been simmering between Thailand and Cambodia for months after a Cambodian soldier was killed in a border clash in May.

The clash in May was a result of a decades of tensions between Thailand and Cambodia over a disputed border. The two countries are locked in a decadeslong dispute over the trijunction of Thailand, Cambodia, and Laos called the ‘Emerald Triangle’. The region has several cultural sites that are of high strategic and symbolic value that both sides lay claim to, such as the Prasat Ta Muen Thom temple.

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The Cambodian shelling and Thai airstrikes follow clashes between Thai and Cambodian ground forces near the Hindu temple of Prasat Ta Muen Thom in the early hours of Thursday. The temple lies in a disputed stretch of the border of the two countries between Thailand’s Surin province and Cambodia’s Oddar Meanchey province.

In the early hours of the day, Thai and Cambodian troops exchanged gunfire near the Prasat Ta Muen Thom temple. The Thai army accused the Cambodian forces of first sending a drone into the area and then firing the first shots. Thailand accused Cambodian soldiers of firing first and said they carried out “targeted attack on civilians”, saying two BM-21 rockets had hit a community in Surin’s Kap Choeng district, injuring three people.

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On its part, Cambodia forces said Thailand was the aggressor. Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet has sought an urgent meeting of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) to address what his government has dubbed “unprovoked military aggression” by Thailand.

“The Thai military violated the territorial integrity of the Kingdom of Cambodia by launching an armed assault on Cambodian forces stationed to defend the nation’s sovereign territory. In response, the Cambodian armed forces exercised their legitimate right to self-defence, in full accordance with international law, to repel the Thai incursion and protect Cambodia’s sovereignty and territorial integrity,” the Cambodian defence ministry said.

The clashes have come shortly after Thailand expelled Cambodia’s envoy after a landmine blast injured five Thai soldiers.

Former Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sne, who is the father of current Prime Minister Hun Manet, said that Thailand had shelled two Cambodian provinces and said “Cambodia has always taken a stand to solve problems peacefully, but in this case we have no choice but to respond with armed forces against armed aggression”.

Thailand’s acting premier Phumtham Wechayachai said the situation was “delicate”.

“We have to be careful. We will follow international law," Wechayachai said.