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Sam Beltran

Asean military observers have now visited both sides of the Thai-Cambodian frontier, measuring damage and recording claims as Bangkok and Phnom Penh continue to trade allegations of ceasefire breaches following last year’s deadly clashes.
In late June, a delegation from member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations fanned out across Thailand and Cambodia, escorted through contested ground and competing narratives.
The fighting last year resulted in more than 100 military and civilian deaths and hundreds of injuries on both sides. Two ceasefires were reached, the first in July and the second in December after heavy fighting had resumed.
Thailand’s military said the 13-member Asean Observer Team travelled to affected areas in Sisaket province on June 25 to assess conditions on the ground, verify reports of incidents and evaluate the impact on local communities.


The delegation visited Phu Makua, Pha Mor E Daeng and Ban Phum Srol where Thai authorities briefed observers on alleged actions by Cambodian troops. These included claims of anti-personnel landmine use and indirect fire, with officials saying rockets had caused damage to property and harmed civilians.
Cambodia’s defence ministry said the team also visited Wat Prasat Ta Moan Sen Chey in Banteay Ampil district, Oddar Meanchey province, where it observed damage to the temple there that Phnom Penh attributed to Thai forces. Cambodian officials further alleged that Thai attacks had struck civilian infrastructure, including schools, hospitals and homes.
In a separate visit on June 18, observers travelled to other sites in Oddar Meanchey, where Cambodian authorities said areas had been attacked, fenced with barbed wire and occupied by Thai troops.
Each side asked the same of the visitors: see what we see. The mission can do little more. Since its initial deployment in interim form last July, the Asean Observer Team has been limited to observing, verifying and reporting. It cannot enforce a ceasefire, compel access or adjudicate claims.

‘Simply theatre’?
Asean observers “are seen simply as theatre”, said Voranai Vanijaka, a political analyst and lecturer at Thammasat University in Bangkok.
They were “going through the motions of observing, shaking hands and offering diplomatic words of no consequence,” he said.
Political scientist Vu Lam also acknowledged this limitation, telling This Week in Asia that “the scale of the conflict exposes how thin the observing mandate is relative to the problem”.
But the team was never designed as a peacekeeping force, said Joanne Lin, a senior fellow at the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute and a visiting scholar at the MIT Centre for International Studies, adding that the observers’ value lay in maintaining channels of communication when trust was scarce and building a shared evidentiary record.
In a narrative war, even neutral observation can be politicised
Joanne Lin, geopolitical analyst
“It’s not a UN-style peacekeeping mission,” she said. “In that sense, it has been useful in keeping Asean present on the ground and helped sustain some level of communication even when trust remains low.”
Lin cautioned, however, that reports from the observers must be consolidated impartially to avoid selective use by either side in what has become an increasingly politicised narrative contest over landmines, displacement and humanitarian access.
“In a narrative war, even neutral observation can be politicised,” she said. “The challenge is that the Asean Observer Team does not independently determine where it can observe.”
Because access relies on arrangements made by the host country, “there is a risk that the visit, imagery or reports could be used to reinforce that side’s narrative, even though the observer team seeks to be neutral”, Lin said.

Analysts say the mission’s limitations mirror those of Asean itself in addressing a long-running and deeply entrenched dispute.
“The dispute is historical, deeply political and predates Asean itself,” said Collins Chong Yew Keat, a foreign affairs, security and strategy analyst at the University of Malaya, noting that even a 1962 ruling awarding the Preah Vihear temple to Cambodia had failed to settle the wider argument.
“It is rooted in colonial-era border arrangements, competing sovereignty claims, unresolved demarcation, nationalist sentiment, military posturing and domestic political pressures.”
Chong said that Asean’s “core limitation” was its lack of enforcement tools.
“Unlike the United States, Asean cannot use market access, tariffs, sanctions or major economic pressure to force restraint,” he said, adding that it was US President Donald Trump’s tariff threats that had brought about the initial ceasefire last July.
The later truce in December followed intensive shuttle diplomacy by China, with Japan contributing personnel and surveillance support.

Domestic politics further constrains compromise, thanks to heightened nationalist sentiment on both sides.
“Any concession can be framed domestically as weakness, betrayal or compromise of sovereignty,” Chong said. “This makes compromise politically difficult even when it is strategically necessary.”
In Thailand, mistrust has been fuelled “among nationalist Thais” by perceptions of political alignment between former leader Thaksin Shinawatra and Cambodia’s Hun Sen, Voranai said.
Thaksin’s daughter, former prime minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra, was removed from office by the Constitutional Court in August last year over what it ruled was a severe ethics violation involving a leaked telephone conversation about the border dispute with former Cambodian leader Hun Sen in which she repeatedly called him “uncle”.
“Any time the Thai government or the military offer any reconciliatory words towards Cambodia, they get crucified on social media,” Voranai said, adding that public sentiment had prevented authorities on either side from backing down too far for fear of a backlash.
Costs of compromise
Asean did retain limited tools to facilitate dialogue, but it “cannot compel either party to the table or enforce compliance”, confirmed political scientist Vu Lam, whose research focuses on the bloc.
The bloc’s principle of non-interference constrained its ability to do much more, he said, even if “it is what holds Asean’s politically diverse membership together”.
Lin said observers’ findings could form the basis for renewed political dialogue, potentially through bilateral mechanisms such as the joint boundary commission or, if both sides agreed, international legal avenues including the International Court of Justice.
She added that Asean itself had underused instruments, such as the High Council mentioned in the bloc’s foundational Treaty of Amity and Cooperation that was designed for mediation and conciliation but had never been activated.

“This crisis should prompt Asean to think more seriously about institutionalising conflict management,” Lin said. “The next step … is to complement observation with mediation, dialogue and preventive diplomacy”
Even with stronger mechanisms, however, outcomes would depend on political will and the “cost of compromise”, Chong said.
“Both sides need to negotiate, but both also need to avoid looking weak before their domestic audiences,” he said, adding that a durable peace would require parallel political, legal and economic measures, including military restraint, strengthened monitoring, calibrated public messaging and improved humanitarian protections to reduce tensions.
Ultimately, analysts said progress would hinge on both sides’ willingness to engage.
“Asean can help bring both sides back to the negotiating table,” Chong said. “But it cannot make them negotiate in good faith.”


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With zero enforcement powers, monitors risk being used to simply validate rival propaganda campaigns, analysts say


With zero enforcement powers, monitors risk being used to simply validate rival propaganda campaigns, analysts say.


Can Asean keep the Thailand-Cambodia peace?

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}With zero enforcement powers, monitors risk being used to simply validate rival propaganda campaigns, analysts say

With zero enforcement powers, monitors risk being used to simply validate rival propaganda campaigns, analysts say