Threat to ban Thai goods

Hun Sen dares Abhisit to call fresh polls, says Thaksin backers will win

By Nirmal Ghosh, Thailand Correspondent 10/11/209
		-- PHOTO: AP

BANGKOK - THE spat between Bangkok and Phnom Penh was in danger of turning uglier on Monday as Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen talked of banning Thai goods if Bangkok closes the border between the two countries.

The Cambodian strongman last week enraged many in the Thai establishment by appointing former premier Thaksin Shinawatra as his economic adviser.

On Cambodian TV on Sunday night, he further needled Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, challenging him to call a snap election and saying that the pro-Thaksin opposition party, Puea Thai, would win it.

Mr Hun Sen, who has been in power for close to 30 years, also said that if Thailand closed the border between the two countries, Cambodia would ban all Thai products.

Kyoto News quoted him as saying that Thailand exported US$2 billion (S$2.7 billion) worth of products to Cambodia last year, while Cambodian exports to Thailand totalled US$90 million.

In Bangkok, Mr Abhisit came under pressure from the right-wing People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD), which presented a list of recommendations on Cambodia to him. Among its demands was that Thailand expel Cambodians from disputed territory and that Thais