Thailand and Cambodia continued fighting for the second day on Friday as the escalating border conflict threatened to spiral into an all-out war between the Southeast Asian nations.
The Thai health ministry said 14 civilians and a soldier had been killed in the fighting so far and 46 people wounded. The Cambodian government did not provide any such details but an provincial official in Oddar Meanchey said a civilian had been killed and five wounded.
The Thai military said its fighter jets bombed targets in Cambodia in response to sustained bombardment with heavy weapons, field artillery and rocket systems.
The neighbours exchanged fire across several disputed zones along the 817km land border on Thursday, sparking the deadliest clashes since 2011. Both nations claimed the other fired first.
Thailand’s acting prime minister Phumtham Wechayachai and the military accused Cambodian forces of deliberately targeting civilian areas.
Cambodia in turn accused the Thai military of “pre-emptively” opening fire on its troops and using heavy artillery.
Thai authorities have evacuated 40,000 civilians from 86 villages near the border since the fighting began. Cambodian officials have not provided any evacuation numbers yet.
The Thai army said it deployed F-16 fighter planes to bomb two military targets in Cambodia. “We have used air power against military targets as planned,” army deputy spokesperson Richa Suksuwanon said.
The Cambodian defence ministry said the Thai warplanes had dropped bombs on a road near the ancient Preah Vihear Temple, close to the border.
In a letter to Pakistan, current president of the United Nations Security Council, Cambodian prime minister Hun Manet asked it to convene a meeting of the body to stop the “unprovoked and premeditated military aggression” by Thailand in violation of international law.
The Security Council is due to meet on Friday to discuss the conflict.
The US, an ally of Thailand, called for an immediate end to hostilities.
State Department deputy spokesperson Tommy Pigott said that Washington was “gravely concerned by the escalating violence along the Thailand-Cambodia border and deeply saddened by reports of harm to civilians”.
“The US urges an immediate cessation of hostilities, protection of civilians and a peaceful resolution of the conflict,” he added.
Malaysian prime minister Anwar Ibrahim, who spoke with his counterparts in Thailand and Cambodia, said the warring parties were willing to consider a ceasefire.
“I welcome the positive signals and willingness shown by both Bangkok and Phnom Penh to consider this path forward. Malaysia stands ready to assist and facilitate this process in the spirit of Asean unity and shared responsibility,” he said.
The conflict erupted a day after a landmine blast maimed five Thai soldiers on Wednesday. Bangkok accused Cambodia of laying new Russian explosives in violation of a key international treaty.
The first exchange of fire occurred at 8.20am local time near Prasat Ta Muen Thom, an ancient Khmer-Hindu temple close to the heavily patrolled border, the Thai army said.
Moments before the firing began, a Cambodian drone was seen flying in the area and six heavily armed soldiers approached a Thai military base, the Thai army claimed.
The Cambodian defence ministry disputed the Thai army’s claims. It accused the Thai army of firing first and claimed that its own soldiers were “responding to an unprovoked incursion by Thai troops that violated our territorial integrity”.
Late on Wednesday, following the landmine incident, Thailand expelled the Cambodian envoy in Bangkok and recalled its own ambassador from Phnom Penh.
Phnom Penh retaliated by reducing diplomatic ties to their lowest level, withdrawing all staff from its Bangkok embassy, and ordering Thai diplomats out of the country, escalating a standoff already inflamed by nationalist outrage, trade boycotts and disputed claims over fatal blasts in the contested frontier zone.
Thailand sealed the border and evacuated thousands of people living near it as many came under heavy artillery fire.
Mr Wechayachai said the situation was “delicate”. “We have to be careful,” he said. “We will follow international law.”
Later in the day, the acting prime minister said that there had as yet been no declaration of war and that the conflict had not spread into other provinces.
Cambodia’s influential former premier Hun Sen, father of the incumbent prime minister, said two provinces had come under shelling from the Thai army. He called for calm, and urged Cambodians to trust their government and armed forces in these tense times.
The premier said Cambodia had “always maintained a position of peaceful resolution of problems but, in this case, we have no choice but to respond with armed force against armed aggression”.
The southeast Asian nations have contested sovereignty over undemarcated places along their border for more than 100 years. The border was initially mapped by France in 1907, when Cambodia was under French colonial rule.
Tensions rose in 2008 after Cambodia tried to register an 11th-century temple located in the disputed region as a Unesco heritage site, drawing protests from Thailand.
The immediate cause of renewed hostilities was an exchange of gunfire in a contested frontier zone on 28 May that killed one Cambodian soldier. Each nation claimed to have acted in self-defence, but tensions quickly escalated.
Several border checkpoints had already been closed or were operating under heavy restrictions after the deadly clash in May.
In the aftermath, Cambodia banned Thai films and TV programmes, suspended imports of fruits, vegetables and fuel from the neighbouring country, and cut access to some of Thailand’s international internet links and electricity supply.
