Thai, Vietnamese Units Clash on Border

Thai and Vietnamese troops have clashed along the Thai-Cambodian border for what is believed to be the first time in the current round of fighting, a Thai officer at the frontier said today.

The officer, who refused to be identified, said Thai soldiers fought a Vietnamese unit that had penetrated about half a mile into Thai territory Monday night.

He said Thai gunners fired mortars at the lightly armed Vietnamese troops who crossed the border at Klong Luek, about 3 1/2 miles south of the Thai border town of Aranyaprathet.

There was no report of casualties, and Thai troops were heading into the area today to determine if the Vietnamese had already withdrawn back into Cambodia, said the officer, contacted by telephone from Bangkok.

It was the first known encounter between Vietnam and Thai troops since Vietnamese soldiers attacked the Cambodian resistance camp of Rithisen near Nong Samet on Christmas day.

Vietnamese artillery shelled the headquarters of the anti-Communist Khmer People’s National Liberation Front earlier Monday, the seventh straight day of fighting between occupation troops and Cambodian guerrillas.

Fighting was reported at Nong Samet and in five districts along the Thai-Cambodian frontier, Thai military and guerrilla sources said.

Thai military officers said Vietnamese artillery shelled Ampil, headquarters of the Liberation Front, for about 30 minutes Monday. About 5,000 guerrillas are defending Ampil, but they--like the other guerrillas fighting to overthrow the Vietnamese-installed regime in Cambodia--have no artillery.

The Vietnamese continued to hold the center of the sprawling Nong Samet camp Monday, despite the seventh day of combat with guerrillas. The camp’s 62,000 civilian residents fled into Thailand last week.