Thailand will send formal protest letters to the UN Human Rights Council and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights after rejecting claims in a report on Cambodia that referred to Thailand.
Foreign Minister Sihasak Phuangketkeow announced the move at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Monday 3 August 2026, saying findings presented by Tom Andrews, the UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in Cambodia, were based on inaccurate and unverified data and lacked neutrality.
Thailand challenges report's UN status
The letters will be sent to the president of the UNHRC and the OHCHR in Geneva. Sihasak, a former president of the UNHRC, said Andrews' comments at a press conference in Phnom Penh represented the assessment of an individual rapporteur, not an officially endorsed UN report.
He said the document had not yet been considered through the UN Human Rights Council's formal review process in Geneva. That process would allow member states, including Thailand, to debate its contents, submit observations and dispute individual claims.
"The report has not yet gone through the official UN Human Rights Council review process in Geneva, where member states - including Thailand - will have the opportunity to debate, raise observations, and contest specific points," Sihasak said.
Displacement and worker claims disputed
Sihasak specifically challenged a reported figure of 650,000 Cambodian civilians said to have been internally displaced by border conflict.
He said the number appeared to include Cambodians living in villages that had encroached on Thai territory during civil conflict more than 50 years ago. On that basis, he said, they did not meet the definition of internally displaced persons.
The minister said the report also failed to account for Thailand's losses, including civilian casualties and military strikes which damaged Thai schools and hospitals. He maintained that Thailand had not initiated the border clashes.
On Cambodian migrant workers, Sihasak rejected allegations that Thai authorities had forcibly deported them. He said Phnom Penh had urged Cambodian citizens to return home, leaving those who returned without employment and creating an internal burden for the Cambodian government.
Picture courtesy of The Nation
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4 August 2026
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