PUBLISHED: 14 Jun 2024 at 04: 00
Paiboon Nititawan, the deputy leader of the Palang Pracharath Party ( PPRP ), has petitioned the Thai Constitution to find out whether the Thai-Cambodge memorandum of understanding from 2001 regarding joint development in the Gulf of Thailand is in violation of the Thai Constitution.
He claimed that he had previously requested a ruling from the judge on April 10, but that the Ombudsman had not done but within the 60-day date. Then he made the decision to speak with the court immediately.
The 2001 MoU, according to Mr. Paiboon, was not approved by the Thai congress prior to signing, which meant it “had no constitutional result from the beginning.”
He claimed that he wanted the court to determine whether the Department of Treaties and Legal Affairs and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs should be held accountable for what he thought had been a democratic violation.
Mr. Paiboon stated that despite earlier recognizing that the MoU had not received political support, the office and the government are still using it as a guide to what has been agreed by both countries regarding the 26, 000 square kilometers of regional lakes in the Gulf of Thailand, which Thailand has independence over.
Mr. Paiboon added that he also requested that the office and the department be instructed to stop using the MoU from 2001 in their work involving the delimitation of the territorial waters in question.
Prior to this, Mr. Paiboon claimed that Thailand would be in a better place when new disputes over Thai-Cambodge overlapping claims arise if the court rules the 2001 MoU to be illegal and has no legal result based on the grounds that it was inadequate from the beginning.
He claimed that Cambodia has often cited the MoU from 2001 to support its claim that Thailand had publicly recognized these regional waters as the domains of both countries ‘ overlapping claims.
The 2001 Thai-Cambodgean MoU was not a treaty and had no mandatory phrases, according to Maris Sangiampongsa, the foreign affairs minister. The two administrations have never reached any partnership regarding the MoU.
The MoU, according to Mr. Maris, does not have any duty that would impair Thailand’s independence over the border province of Trat, Koh Kood, or OCA.
More issues need to be thrashed out pending the prosecutor’s choice, he said.