Viet Officers, Thais Agree on DMZ at Border

Vietnam and Thailand agreed Thursday on the demarcation of a disputed stretch of the Thai-Cambodian border near a captured guerrilla base and established a demilitarized zone in the area, a Thai general said.

Maj. Gen. Salya Sriphen, commander of Thailand’s eastern task force, said the demilitarized zone was formed after the intrusion of Vietnamese troops into Thai territory nearly provoked border warfare.

He said that a 22-yard strip on each side of the border near the captured Ampil base “will be our DMZ.”

Vietnamese officers agreed to the zone Thursday when they decided to pull their troops back from the border, ending a 24-hour confrontation with Thai forces, he said.

“Everything was put calmly and peacefully” to the Vietnamese, he said. Salya said the Vietnamese said they were misinformed as to the exact location of the border.

“We just want to avoid any possibility of our territory being in dispute,” Salya said.

Flags Mark Border Once the border location was settled, Salya said, the Vietnamese troops cleared out of an area 1.2 miles long, running north and south along an anti-tank ditch. Thai soldiers then started placing orange flags and other markers along the border line, Salya said.

Vietnamese forces in Cambodia overran the Cambodian rebels’ headquarters at Ampil on Monday and Tuesday, forcing thousands of fighters of the Khmer People’s National Liberation Front to flee.

After securing the camp, where more than 20,000 Cambodian refugees had lived a week ago, unarmed Vietnamese officers appeared on the bridge at Ban Sangae on Wednesday and told a Thai sergeant that Cambodian territory extended to the eastern side of a ditch the Thais had dug under the bridge.

The Thais insisted that the ditch was well inside their territory.

Reinforced Thai forces went on full alert Wednesday over what Bangkok viewed as an incursion by Vietnamese forces into Thai territory. Appeals by loudspeaker and a deadline to pull back went unheeded by the Vietnamese, and senior Thai officers said their country would fight if necessary. But the dispute was settled Thursday.

189 Reported Killed The estimated 5,000 guerrilla fighters who pulled out of Ampil when the Vietnamese captured it have mounted no serious counteroffensive, Thai intelligence sources said.

The guerrillas’ Free Khmer Radio, monitored in Aranyaprathet on Thursday, quoted Phnom Penh radio as saying the Vietnamese killed 189 guerrillas and wounded 50 others in taking Ampil. Free Khmer Radio said the front’s forces killed or wounded 200 Vietnamese troops in the battle.

The claims could not be independently verified.

Hanoi’s attacks so far this year have focused on the camps of the anti-Communist Khmer People’s National Liberation Front, which is led by former Premier Son Sann, 73. They are coalition pa1920233061non-Communist fighters loyal to former head of state Prince Norodom Sihanouk.

The three groups joined to oppose the Vietnamese who invaded Cambodia in late 1978, ending Pol Pot’s reign of terror and setting up a pro-Hanoi regime in Phnom Penh. Battles along the 450-mile Thai-Cambodian border have continued for five years.