PM:Thai-Cambodian JC will soon meet

BANGKOK, November 12 (TNA) - Thai Prime Minister and Defence Minister Yingluck Shinawatra says that the Thai-Cambodian Joint Commission (JC) will soon meet, after Thai Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Surapong Tovichakchaikul returns from The Hague in the Netherlands. Yingluck told journalists on Tuesday, after the Cabinet's weekly meeting, that her government will contact Phnom Penh to fix an exact date for the next Thai-Cambodian JC meeting after Surapong arrives home. Yingluck acknowledged, however, that Thai soldiers stationed along the Thai-Cambodian border, near the Preah Vihear Temple, have remained guarding the Thai border and there has been no plan to withdraw the Thai border troops. Surapong attended Monday's ruling of The Hague-based International Court of Justice (ICJ) over a disputed land near the ancient temple. Yingluck insisted that the Thai and Cambodian governments will use the existing JC mechanism to resolve border issues and to jointly develop the unsettled area around the Preah Vihear Temple, as advised by the ICJ, after the ancient Hindu temple has been listed as a World Heritage site by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). According to the Thai prime minister, her administration has set up a subcommittee to study the ICJ's November 11 verdict in details. The prime minister stressed that Thailand has not lost any territory to Cambodia and the World Court did not mention about the disputed 4.6-square-kilometre area during the ruling. The prime minister noted that her government will explain in details the ICJ's verdict at a joint parliamentary sitting of the Upper and Lower Houses on November 13. The ICJ ruled in 1962 that the Preah Vihear Temple belongs to neighbouring Cambodia, but its surrounding land has remained in dispute. (TNA)