ICJ begins reading verdict of Preah Vihear dispute

[bigbamboo]

Look and learn ,

Thailand and Cambodia have a ruling over: - a "few stones" and some territory.

Meanwhile in Europe the dispute still goes on over: - "one stone" and some seagull s**t.

Just don't know who should look, who should learn?

Legally nobody 'owns' it.

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

Here's Reuters' take on it, which pretty much declares the ruling a victory for Cambodia... but also includes the detail that all the land other than the Preah Vihear promontory was left unresolved by the court. Again, no detailing of the kilometer area adjudicated vs. the portion left in dispute.

The land they are referring to is 4.6-square km (1.8 sq mile) of scrub surrounding Preah Vihear.

The court said the northern edge of the promontory, upon which Preah Vihear sits, was Cambodian, as agreed in the 1906 treaty between Thailand, then called Siam, and French Cambodia.

"The 1962 judgment required Thailand to withdraw from the whole territory of the promontory ... to Thai territory," judges said in clarifying the original ruling.

The territory they were referring to, however, was just one part of the of the 4.6 sq km that is in dispute, leaving scope for more disagreement.

The court was only able to clarify jurisdiction of promontory that was covered in its 1962 ruling and said it had no authority to rule on rival claims to other land.

http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2013/11/11/world/asia/11reuters-thailand-cambodia.html?ref=preahviheartemple&_r=0

[bigbamboo]

Nice of the foreign minister to speak Thai in front of the foreigners who represented Thailand and refer to them as 'farang' ... surely could have used a more polite term such as ****Thai language removed**** ... cheeky bastard!

Maybe he learned his English studying for a masters in Kentucky too?

[Bender]

Good news everyone, now every foreigner who owns a house/temple/tent... anywhere in Thailand

can claims sovereignety over the land and take the case to the ICJ

More seriously this land belong to Cambodian for hundreds, maybe thousand, years and it will belong forever to them.

ICJ was really fair. End of talk!

Edited November 11, 2013 by Bender

[hellodolly]

From the other paper, it seems that not the whole 4.6kms is Cambodian. That's the way I read it anyway.

My wife is watching this news on Thai TV and says that the land the temple is on is Cambodian but the surrounding land is Thai?? I have always thought that the Thai language lacks precision and statements have many different meanings. Perhaps because the people that make them bend them to suit themselves? We shall see

Actually she is not far wrong. The promontory the temple is on is Cambodian and it borders the rest of Cambodia to the east. The level land below the promontory to the north, south and west has not been ruled on so presumably stays Thai.

I believe that some of the 4.6 km land Thailand had been claiming is on the promontory and that has been adjudicated to Cambodia, but at least half of it, maybe more, is below the promontory.

Indeed -- nothing has changed so very much. It will be fairly easy to say that Thailand has won a victory of maintaining the status of several sq kms of land and is happy to have the boundary of the temple lands clarified as being only the promontory. Equally -- Cambodia can say that they won their rights to temple and it's lands. Win - Win.

Getting the local commanders on both sides to back down quietly will need a bit of fancy footwork, but not impossible as long as the hotheads and extremists are kept off the patch.

Meantime -- in the Gulf of Thailand, the papers are probably already drawn up to agree sea-bed boundaries and drilling rights

I tend to agree with you about it being a win win situation. I feel how ever it could be much better if the two countries could put together a joint venture where neither country loses any thing but both gain through an understanding of mutual friendship and development of the area,

I guess what I am saying it can be even better than a win win situation. As I have said before this was a Yellow shirt caused problem and much as I dislike Thaksin he did have a working agreement on it. As well as he had brought in water managment specalists to help with the water managment in Thailand. Scrapped by his brother in law but it did have some good suggestions in it.

[hellodolly]

ICJ awarded Cambodia enough land just West of the temple to build a road up there. The Thais can stay on their hill watching all the tourists go from Cambodia towards the temple, instead of going there from Thai side. That's what it was all about, so there is no status quo. Cambodia got what it came for.

Cambodia got what it came for

They came for nothing all they were trying to do was have the Temple declared a National Heritage Site. Thailand was happy with every thing and had no problem with that. It was the Yellow shirts who stirred every thing up. Abhist wanted nothing to do with it but the yellow shirts forced it on him the same as Yingluck wants nothing to do with it but must deal with the aftermath of the Yellow Shirt trouble makers.

We now stand at a point where we can show growth in the government by making viable use of the courts decision in a joint venture with Cambodia. This is now in Yingluck's hands. Will she grow a set of balls to replace the ones her cowardly brother is lacking and do the rite thing or continue to squabble over a few square kilometers of useless land.

[Trouble]

It's taken 7 pages of posts for everyone to give their worthless opinions and/or explanations on a verdict which we could read ourselves in about 5 seconds.

[oldsailor35]

ICJ got it right... now it's time to follow the umpires decision.

The only thing that makes it right is that the ICJ decided it.

I think the 1962 decision was wrong myself, but the ICJ decided otherwise.

Preah Vehear is 900 years old, how old is Thailand

[Sheryl]

Map to define the exact ruling ?

yea - well -- that's the rub --- the maps are not drawn by the court -- only a verbal description of the boundaries is given. As for maps --- it depends on whose version you want to look at

Hence the court's very wise decision to base their ruling on a clear geographical feature: the promontory.

[Trembly]

ICJ got it right... now it's time to follow the umpires decision.

The only thing that makes it right is that the ICJ decided it.

I think the 1962 decision was wrong myself, but the ICJ decided otherwise.

Preah Vehear is 900 years old, how old is Thailand

Hadrian's wall . . . . Italy?

[GeorgeKi]

Outrage!

European imperialists created this problem, and now their kangaroo court attempts to rob Thailand of what is clearly its own.

What grotesque racist nonsense.

It is the international Court of Justice - got that i-n-t-e-r-n-a-t-i-o-n-a-l - not European.

A give away can be seen in the names of the judges - Hisashi Owada , Abdulqawi Ahmed Yusuf .

Of the 13 current judges only 3 (three) are European.

A country has no 'right' to all of any particular geological feature - Switzerland has no 'right' to the Alps.

[JoeLing]

More seriously this land belong to Cambodian for hundreds, maybe thousand, years and it will belong forever to them.

ICJ was really fair. End of talk!

Go on, that's like saying Britain belongs to the Italians, direct descendants of the Romans.

Half of Spain belongs to some African Nation and Gibraltar belongs to Spain.

How far back in history do we have to go to determine what belongs to whom?

Past wars can not be undone and revert everything back to how it was 100, 1000 or 10'000 years ago.

From my understanding, the ruling was done in 1963, all it needed was Interpretation, translation.

Next step will probably be clarification which might take quite a few more years until it's all clear.

[JoeLing]

Look and learn ,

Thailand and Cambodia have a ruling over: - a "few stones" and some territory.

Meanwhile in Europe the dispute still goes on over: - "one stone" and some seagull s**t.

Just don't know who should look, who should learn?

Legally nobody 'owns' it.

That's probably why I never understand when people say:

"If you don't like it, go back to your "OWN" country"

[jpinx]

Map to define the exact ruling ?

yea - well -- that's the rub --- the maps are not drawn by the court -- only a verbal description of the boundaries is given. As for maps --- it depends on whose version you want to look at

Hence the court's very wise decision to base their ruling on a clear geographical feature: the promontory.

Courts generally don't like to be forced to draw a map. Their clear verbal description leaves much less room for mis-understandings, but at the same time allows the parties to be sensible when they jointly survey the ground and draw the map by consensus.

[kuiburi]

i wonder if cambodia can file for damages, the lines were clearly drawn yet thailand greed was responsible for the death of many

1904 the line was drawn and agreed on by both sides that ruled in these days, they put the border on the watershedline of the Dangrek mountainrange , 1907 French officers draw a new line , Thailand never agreed .

So is it greed or do some French officers have the right to put a border where ever they want ?

[jpinx]

i wonder if cambodia can file for damages, the lines were clearly drawn yet thailand greed was responsible for the death of many

1904 the line was drawn and agreed on by both sides that ruled in these days, they put the border on the watershedline of the Dangrek mountainrange , 1907 French officers draw a new line , Thailand never agreed .

So is it greed or do some French officers have the right to put a border where ever they want ?

Would that 1904 map not put everything in dispute firmly into Cambodia?

The French conquered and colonised, and could what they liked. Same as England did to Ireland History is most usually written by the conquerors

Edited November 11, 2013 by jpinx

[Bender]

i wonder if cambodia can file for damages, the lines were clearly drawn yet thailand greed was responsible for the death of many

1904 the line was drawn and agreed on by both sides that ruled in these days, they put the border on the watershedline of the Dangrek mountainrange , 1907 French officers draw a new line , Thailand never agreed .

So is it greed or do some French officers have the right to put a border where ever they want ?

greed??

I guess we have also history expert on TV.

If it was "greed", i guess the french (or british )can have easly take over all Thailand... but they just were not interested!

[MikeOboe57]

If anyone is interested in the Original court ruling from 1962:

http://www.worldcourts.com/icj/eng/decisions/1962.06.15_preah_vihear.htm

What is, however, a lot more interesting are the statements of the three judges that did not concur with the ruling - attached at the end. They clearly show that the court's decision is severely flawed. It is especially noteworthy that the court did not verify the case on site and merely resorted to legal nitpicking.

One of the dissenting judges, Lucio M. Moreno Quintana, states:

[...]

(1) the essential question to be settled by the Court—since neither Party has conclusively proved its exercise of sovereignty over the temple area—is the interpretation 'of Article 1 of the Treaty of 13 February 1904 between France and Thailand; [p 74]

(2) this interpretation follows from the determination of the watershed between the two river basins which is specified to be the frontier between Cambodia and Thailand in the Dangrek region;

(3) the technical evidence supplied by Thailand, largely contributed to by Cambodia's cross-examination, is by its precision and abundance conclusive in establishing that the watershed follows the edge of the cliff of the promontory on which the temple is situated;

(4) this result decides the case in the sense that the portion of territory on which the temple stands is situated in Thai territory.

Judge Wellington Koo is also quite blunt in his verdict:

[...] I find that the grounds upon which the Judgment is based cannot be sustained in fact or in law. [...]

And Judge Sir Percy Spender remarks in the opening lines of his brillant statement:

[...] The case, in my view, is peculiarly one in which a conclusion may safely be reached only by a detailed examination of the evidence and a strict application thereto of the relevant principles of international law.

My own examination has led me to the conclusion that Cambodia has failed to make out any claim for relief. [...]

and ends with this conclusion:

Whether the Mixed Commission did or did not delimit the Dangrek, the truth, in my opinion, is that the frontier line on that mountain range is today the line of the watershed.

The Court however has upheld a frontier line which is not the line of the watershed, one which in the critical area of the Temple is an entirely different one.

This finds its justification in the application of the concepts of recognition or acquiescence.

With profound respect for the Court, I am obliged to say that in my judgment, as a result of a misapplication of these concepts and an inadmissible extension of them, territory, the sovereignty in which, both by treaty and by the decision of the body appointed under treaty to determine the frontier line, is Thailand's, now becomes vested in Cambodia.

The ICJ botched it in 1962 by giving a temple to Cambodia without access - thanks to terrain. Consequently they had to resettle this affair in 2013 by handing more territory to Cambodia. Their only admission that they bungled it 1962 was by not giving in to Cambodia's full 4.6 sqkm demand.

[bigbamboo]

Everyone should just chill.

It will all belong to China one day anyway.

[anotheruser]

i wonder if cambodia can file for damages, the lines were clearly drawn yet thailand greed was responsible for the death of many

1904 the line was drawn and agreed on by both sides that ruled in these days, they put the border on the watershedline of the Dangrek mountainrange , 1907 French officers draw a new line , Thailand never agreed .

So is it greed or do some French officers have the right to put a border where ever they want ?

Would that 1904 map not put everything in dispute firmly into Cambodia?

The French conquered and colonised, and could what they liked. Same as England did to Ireland History is most usually written by the conquerors

Give Issan back while you are at it.

[Arkady]

i wonder if cambodia can file for damages, the lines were clearly drawn yet thailand greed was responsible for the death of many

1904 the line was drawn and agreed on by both sides that ruled in these days, they put the border on the watershedline of the Dangrek mountainrange , 1907 French officers draw a new line , Thailand never agreed .

So is it greed or do some French officers have the right to put a border where ever they want ?

It was a little more complex than that as far as I am aware. The treaty called for a joint Franco-Siamese commission to be set up and determine the precise border following the general agreement that it should follow the Dangrek watershed line. The commission was established but the Siamese side didn't have any cartographers, so they allowed the French cartographers to do the survey work. The joint commission was thus never joint and and ceased to exist in effect before the map was finished. Therefore it didn't approve the map, as it was supposed to do under the treaty. The French went ahead and produced the map anyway and the French minister in Bangkok sent it to the King who sent a thank you note via the foreign minister. It seems to me that the French were guilty of mischief in that their survey team must have come across the temple and thought it looked rather fine, so they diverted the border line from the watershed to include in French territory. It was then an unknown Khmer temple in a very isolated, virtually uninhabited area that must have been a couple of weeks journey from Bangkok. It seems unlikely that anyone from the Siamese side pointed out the discrepancy to the King or the foreign minister. If they were aware, they might have thought it was unimportant or not worth risking a confrontation with the French over. You have to remember that in the 1904 treaty the Siamese ceded Khmer territory all way up to and including Siem Reap and all of Laos to the French. The French colonial administration in Saigon was aggressively expansionary at that time and the treaty was deemed necessary to prevent the French from demanding even more Siamese territory in Isaan and Chantaburi which they occupied for several years. Reeling from a huge chunk of their country being lopped off, the Siamese must have been too punch drunk to protest about an uninhabited sliver on the other side of the watershed. In the treaty the French were also able to insist that the Siamese could not station any troops within 40 km of the French border which gives a clear idea of the threat implicit in the treaty.

The loss of the four northern Unfederated Malay states to Britain under the 1909 Anglo-Siam Treaty five years later must have been far less of a blow. Those states had been only loosely administered by Bangkok and had their own sultans as tributary rulers, while the Muslim Malay populations could not be assimilated into Thai culture, as is evident from the development of today's three southernmost Thai provinces which the British left to Siam because Siamese rule was actually more pervasive there. (Instability in the loosely controlled Siamese Malay states was perceived as a threat to British Malaya.) In addition, as a quid pro quo the British provided Siam with soft loans it badly wanted to extend its new railway network to the Malayan border opening up an area to development and taxation that was otherwise inaccessible inland. In general the British sympathised with Siam over French incursions but was unwilling to provoke a war with the jingoist Saigon administration that could have had ramifications in Europe. The Siamese civil service at the time employed large numbers of European advisors, of whom the British were the largest single group but made a point of not hiring any Frenchmen due to the bitter border disputes that had prevailed for years before the 1904 treaty While Britain could be perceived as having done Siam a favour by annexing the Northern Unfederated Malay states, the Khmer and Lao populations of the provinces lost to the France were far easier to govern (without the French being involved) and, being Buddhist peoples of similar culture to the Siamese, could be far more easily assimilated. In fact over a third of Thailand's present day population is ethnically Lao, many of whom were forcibly relocated by the Siamese to the previously uninhabited Khorat plateau and the area around Petchburi. If the looming threat of war with Germany had not curtailed French colonial ambitions, it is more than likely that the French would have come back for a second bite of the cherry and would have perhaps have grabbed land as far as Khon Kaen and Chantaburi. France had large numbers of French citizens of Chinese and Indochinese origin living in Siam who were not subject to Siamese law or taxes. It was always looking for excuses to intervene to protect the rights of those citizens, many of whom used their extraterritorial status to practise banditry and and extortion while the French consuls turned a blind eye.

[jpinx]

http://www.worldcourts.com/icj/eng/decisions/1962.06.15_preah_vihear.htm

Interesting reading indeed. Looks like an opportunity for successful appeal was missed. One wonders about the competency of the various experts who accepted the newer border after it had been so obviously moved by the French surveyor.

All water under the bridge now, but fascinating nevertheless.

[Lakegeneve]

Outrage!

European imperialists created this problem, and now their kangaroo court attempts to rob Thailand of what is clearly its own.

It is absurd that the massive plateau and promontory on which Preah Vihar rests is everywhere part of Thailand except somehow for just this tiny sliver of land on which the temple sits. How long could,say, a similar Laotian claim to land south of the Mekong endure similar ridicule? Well, the topographical features at Preah Vihar are arguably even more pronounced than those of the mighty Mekong.

The high plateau is everywhere Thailand and must remain so. The Thais make no claim to the land beneath the plateau, and nor would Kampuchea be making its absurd claims to the land above if it hadnt been for European interference in local affairs.

Nor is there no logic to the argument that some put forward that because the Khmer built the temple it should belong to them. Is the beautiful Khmer temple at Panom Rung, kilometers not meters inside Thai territory, now also to be given to Kampuchea because it was built by the Khmer? Nor is the fact that the temple faces north an argument for Thai sovereignty. Topography alone is the historical basis of the frontier, and this dispute is the result of a cartographical sleight of hand made by the French imperialists.

Let us hope that Thailand will immediately reject this outrage from the Europeans and remind them that the dispute has its origins in French colonial mischief. Then we might hope that Thailand would invite Kampuchea to negotiations on allowing its citizens access to the temple.

My sympathies go to the Thai people and government who are forced to suffer this unwarranted affront to their national dignity. Let us hope that this outrage brings together all elements of Thai society in unified opposition to meddling by outsiders.

Outsiders are not meddling. The ICJ was asked by both Thailand and Cambidia to rule on their territorial dispute.

Given the absence of logic in anything you have written earthpig it might be time to get your snout out of the earth, read the judgement and understand the basics of how international law works. You may also wish to inform yourself a little more on the history of this issue as the previous Kingdom of Siam, and subsequently Thailand, had plenty of previous opportunities prior to the 1962 decision to assert a greater territorial claim in the area if so desired.

Cambodia lodged this case for clarification of the surrounding territory based on the 1962 decision - a judgement that Thailand never disputed in the decades thereafter. Thailand agreed, as all good states of the international community do, to abide by this decision. The ICJ deals with dozens of these territorial cases a year. Unfortunately, in every one a small number of ignorant buffoons such as yourself make the sort of illogical and nonsensical comments.

Finally, you should note that the Joint Border Committee framework established by Thailand and Cambodia and empowered to demarcate the border, could have easily have solved this disputed 4.6 sqkm had the issue not become politicised. Indeed, given that the border will still require demarcation based on this ICJ judgement most likely the JBC will be the process of implementation of the judgement.

[Colabamumbai]

I think that most of us who live here knew that the ruling would be for Cambodia.

Wake up Thailand. You agreed to abide by the decision.

[Soutpeel]

It's taken 7 pages of posts for everyone to give their worthless opinions and/or explanations on a verdict which we could read ourselves in about 5 seconds.

Nice to see your not letting the side down by giving your worthless opinion on worthless opinions then

[LomSak27]

This decision was ever in doubt ?

Well lets see how the thai spinmiesters spin it - should have some expats spining to as a number here bought into the conspiracy theory mumbo jumbo the yellows were pawning to the simple minded

Sad fact that!

[whybother]

ICJ got it right... now it's time to follow the umpires decision.

The only thing that makes it right is that the ICJ decided it.

I think the 1962 decision was wrong myself, but the ICJ decided otherwise.

and your opinion counts for .....?

Last I checked, this was a forum to discuss opinions.

[F4UCorsair]

I was living in Phnom Penh in 2003 when a Thai actress (can't remember her name) publicly said that Thailand should own the temple because at least they know how to exploit it for tourism.

That night, every business identifiable as Thai, was burnt to the ground, with the exception of the Bangkok Bakery. It was in an out of the way location so was spared. Tanks were on the street, and gunfire went on right throughout the night.

[whybother]

Outrage!

European imperialists created this problem, and now their kangaroo court attempts to rob Thailand of what is clearly its own.

It is absurd that the massive plateau and promontory on which Preah Vihar rests is everywhere part of Thailand except somehow for just this tiny sliver of land on which the temple sits. How long could,say, a similar Laotian claim to land south of the Mekong endure similar ridicule? Well, the topographical features at Preah Vihar are arguably even more pronounced than those of the mighty Mekong.

The high plateau is everywhere Thailand and must remain so. The Thais make no claim to the land beneath the plateau, and nor would Kampuchea be making its absurd claims to the land above if it hadnt been for European interference in local affairs.

Nor is there no logic to the argument that some put forward that because the Khmer built the temple it should belong to them. Is the beautiful Khmer temple at Panom Rung, kilometers not meters inside Thai territory, now also to be given to Kampuchea because it was built by the Khmer? Nor is the fact that the temple faces north an argument for Thai sovereignty. Topography alone is the historical basis of the frontier, and this dispute is the result of a cartographical sleight of hand made by the French imperialists.

Let us hope that Thailand will immediately reject this outrage from the Europeans and remind them that the dispute has its origins in French colonial mischief. Then we might hope that Thailand would invite Kampuchea to negotiations on allowing its citizens access to the temple.

My sympathies go to the Thai people and government who are forced to suffer this unwarranted affront to their national dignity. Let us hope that this outrage brings together all elements of Thai society in unified opposition to meddling by outsiders.

Outsiders are not meddling. The ICJ was asked by both Thailand and Cambidia to rule on their territorial dispute.

Only Cambodia asked.

[whybother]

ICJ got it right... now it's time to follow the umpires decision.

The only thing that makes it right is that the ICJ decided it.

I think the 1962 decision was wrong myself, but the ICJ decided otherwise.

Preah Vehear is 900 years old, how old is Thailand

It's irrelevant how old it is. What is relevant is treaties and agreements between governments.

If you want to bring in the age of things, maybe you had better start redrawing European countries boundaries.