Asean summit: Trump jets in to preside over Thai-Cambodia peace deal spectacle
Observers warn the US president’s focus on the spectacle of the ‘Kuala Lumpur Accords’ risks impeding their lasting implementation
The American leader is seeking to emboss his credentials as a global peacemaker-in-chief, after sealing a fragile truce between Israel and Hamas and helping to soothe tensions between India and Pakistan.
A brief, bloody border row between Thailand and Cambodia in July left dozens dead on both sides of their contested frontier, one that is based on disputed French colonial-era maps.
Anutin will be in the Malaysian capital to sign the agreement, according to Thai Defence Minister General Nattaphon Narkpanit. Nattaphon’s comment to reporters on Saturday ended days of uncertainty over whether Bangkok and Phnom Penh could put the deadly squabble behind them in time for Trump’s visit.
Trump has claimed full credit for driving the peace deal through, using trade deals and high tariffs as a threat to get the two countries to the negotiating table in August.