- Army received reports of attacks on soldiers with firearms: Thai Army.
- Thailand begins “using aircraft to attack military targets in multiple areas”.
- Cambodia claims Thailand fired “several shots at the Tamone Thom Temple”.
Thailand launched airstrikes on its neighbor Cambodia on Monday, the Thai army said, with both sides blaming the latest outbreak of fighting on their disputed border, which killed a Thai soldier.
After Cambodian troops fired on Thai forces early Monday morning in Ubon Ratchathani province, “the army received reports that Thai soldiers were attacked with supporting fire, resulting in one soldier killed and four injured,” Thai army spokesman Winthai Suvaree said in a statement.
Winthai also said Thailand had begun “using aircraft to attack military targets in several areas” to suppress attacks by Cambodian forces.
A spokeswoman for Cambodia’s defense minister, Maly Socheata, said Thai forces launched an attack on Cambodian troops in the border provinces of Preah Vihear and Oddar Meanchey early Monday morning, accusing Thailand of “firing several shots with tanks at the Tamone Thom temple” and other areas near the Preah Vihear temple.
She said Cambodia did not retaliate.
Met Measpheakdey, a Cambodian spokesman for the Oddar Meanchey provincial administration, said gunfire was reported in the areas of the centuries-old Tamone Thom and Ta Krabei temples and that a “number of villagers living near the border are fleeing to safety”.
Thailand’s Second Army Region said in a statement that around 35,000 people in Thailand have been evacuated from areas along the border with Cambodia since the renewed fighting.
Both sides reported a brief skirmish on Sunday that Thailand’s military said left two soldiers wounded.
Five days of clashes erupted between Thailand and Cambodia this summer, killing 43 people and displacing around 300,000 before a ceasefire came into effect.
