Cambodia and Thailand Extend Battle

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (Reuters) — A second day of fighting between Thai and Cambodian troops on Saturday killed at least four soldiers, bringing the two-day death toll to 11, the worst bloodshed since the United Nations called for a cease-fire in February.

Thousands of villagers have been evacuated from the disputed border area in jungles near the Ta Moan and Ta Krabey temples, about 90 miles west of the 900-year-old Preah Vihear temple, the site of a deadly four-day standoff in February.

Lt. Gen. Thawatchai Samutsakorn of the Thai Army said one of his soldiers had been killed. A local hospital said 13 were wounded.

Suos Sothea, deputy commander of Cambodia’s artillery unit in the area, said three Cambodian soldiers had been killed and 11 wounded, bringing the two-day toll of wounded on both sides to at least 43.

The Cambodia Defense Ministry condemned “these repeated deliberate acts of aggression” and called on Thailand to cease “hostilities.” It accused Thailand of firing cluster munitions — weapons banned by many countries — as well as shells “loaded with poisonous gas.”

The Thai foreign affairs minister, Kasit Piromya, denied those accusations as “groundless.”

Sovereignty over the ancient, stone-walled Hindu temples — Preah Vihear, Ta Moan and Ta Krabey — and the jungle of the Dangrek Mountains surrounding them has been in dispute since the withdrawal of the French from Cambodia in the 1950s.

Ta Moan and Ta Krabey, perched on an escarpment about seven miles apart in terrain riddled by land mines, were built in the 12th century when the Khmer empire stretched across parts of Thailand and Vietnam before shrinking to present-day Cambodia.

Thailand says that according to a 1947 map, the two temples are in its Surin Province. Cambodia rejects that claim and says they are in its Oddar Meanchey Province. Before Friday, the two countries jointly patrolled the area largely without incident.