BANGKOK: At a Thai university-turned-shelter for displaced people, Kanlaya Somjettana is reluctant to go home even after a truce halted weeks of border clashes with Cambodia, fearing the violence may not be over.
She said some people forced to flee the fighting began returning home on Sunday, a day after the ceasefire was announced, but many evacuees on both sides of the border preferred waiting for an official word that it was safe.
Some cited a lack of trust that the neighboring country would respect the truce, after previous ones had been broken.
“I really hope this ceasefire will last long and we can return home,” 21-year-old homemaker Kanlaya said from the university campus in Thailand’s Surin city.
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Officials on both sides said the day-old ceasefire was holding on Sunday, but for most areas, there has been no all-clear notice just yet.
“But I will not go back home as long as authorities do not confirm that it is safe,” she said, adding that the evacuation center was now less crowded, although hundreds remained there.
On the Cambodian side, 35-year-old So Choeun said she expected to give birth within days and hoped to then take her baby home, about 1 kilometer from the border.
But not yet, said the woman sheltering with family under makeshift tents at a Buddhist pagoda in Banteay Meanchey province.
“Despite the ceasefire, we dare not return home yet. We are still frightened,” she said.
“We will wait to see the situation for a few days, if it will stay calm.”
Officials on both sides said the day-old ceasefire was holding on Sunday, but for most areas, there has been no all-clear notice just yet.
The truce follows three weeks of renewed cross-border fighting that killed at least 47 people and displaced more than a million on both sides.
