Thailand’s foreign minister, Sihasak Phuangketkeow, speaking in Astana, Kazakhstan, said the compulsory conciliation Cambodia opened over their maritime boundary will move within 30 days to the appointment of a commission chairman and then to a framework for negotiations, the Bangkok Post reported on Saturday.
Thailand had already consulted on the choice of that chairman, Sihasak said, and while the procedure does not require both governments to approve the appointment, he would prefer Bangkok and Phnom Penh to settle on a neutral candidate. The chair has not been named, and the 30-day window runs from Thailand’s 19 June response to Cambodia’s notification.
Under Annex V of the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea, the four conciliators the two governments have appointed have 30 days to choose a fifth as chairman. Should they fail to agree, either side may ask the UN Secretary-General to make the appointment, which the convention requires him to do in consultation with both governments. Neither capital fills the seat on its own.
The dispute concerns an overlapping-claims area of about 26,000 square kilometres in the Gulf of Thailand believed to hold large reserves of oil and natural gas, according to The Diplomat. Cambodia opened the conciliation on 2 June, notifying Thailand and the Secretary-General, after the Thai government terminated in May the 2001 memorandum that had framed maritime talks for a quarter of a century, according to Reuters. Sihasak defended that termination, saying it was meant to build a new negotiating framework once both countries had become parties to the convention, and that Cambodia pursued the compulsory process rather than the bilateral route Bangkok had sought, the Bangkok Post reported.
Both governments have filed declarations under Article 298 of the convention excluding maritime delimitation from binding courts and tribunals, so neither can take the boundary itself to litigation. The conciliation Cambodia invoked is the compulsory procedure that survives those exclusions: a state that has filed the Article 298 exclusion must, at another party’s request, accept conciliation under Annex V. Its commission hears both sides and proposes terms; it does not rule. That commission sets its own procedure and reports within 12 months of being constituted, and the convention states the report binds neither government. Thailand has held that the proceedings should be confined to drawing the maritime boundary, while Cambodia had sought to include joint development of the area’s resources, according to the Thai foreign ministry.
Hun Manet, Cambodia’s prime minister, said on 2 June the step protected the country’s sovereignty and maritime rights under international law, according to Reuters. Foreign Minister Prak Sokhonn told diplomats in Phnom Penh that Cambodia had concluded it had no alternative once the memorandum was cancelled, The Diplomat reported. Cambodia named Prak Sokhonn as its agent and appointed Peter Taksøe-Jensen and Jean-Marc Thouvenin as conciliators; Thailand named Sihasak as agent and appointed Albert Hoffmann of South Africa and Rüdiger Wolfrum of Germany, whom the Thai foreign ministry described as former presidents of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea.
Sihasak said Thailand believed Cambodia’s claim would be difficult to sustain under international law, dismissing speculation about the worst outcome of the process, the Bangkok Post reported. Thailand’s objection is that the Cambodian line cuts across the Thai island of Koh Kood. That argument goes to the boundary; Thailand’s 19 June response did not challenge the commission’s competence, according to the Thai foreign ministry. Cambodia has grounded its claim in international law and described the conciliation as a peaceful settlement, while Thailand has framed its own conduct, the termination included, as lawful framework-building. The commission, not either government, will weigh the two.
Thailand remains in the case on the merits. The forum and the 30-day timetable now run under Annex V, the compulsory track Cambodia invoked and Thailand could not decline once it had filed its own exclusion of binding adjudication. Whatever terms the commission proposes, including on the boundary, it reports within 12 months of being constituted, and the convention states the report binds neither government.