Last week, reports surfaced that Cambodia and Laos had forged some sort of consensus to manage longstanding border issues. While both sides have long sought such mechanisms following previous rounds of tensions, the so-called consensus deserves close scrutiny given the opportunities and challenges it presents for the two countries.
As I have noted before in these pages, Laos and Cambodia, two neighboring Southeast Asian states, share a 540-kilometer, partly demarcated land border, which has been a source of occasional disputes and differences. In 2016, simmering border tensions yet again threatened to boil over into potential conflict and the situation was only de-escalated following intervention by the leaderships of both sides.
Read the full story: https://thediplomat.com/2018/09/a-new-cambodia-laos-border-deal/
