Cambodia, Thai rail link finally reopened
Print Edition
The leaders of Cambodia and Thailand met yesterday at the Thai border town of Aranyaprathet to mark the ceremonial reopening of a rail link that will restore train service between the two countries after more than four decades.
Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen and his Thai counterpart, Prayuth Chan-Ocha, took a brief train ride across the border from Aranyaprathet to Cambodia’s Poipet to celebrate the occasion. Each also shoveled some cement to mark the completion of a nearby cross-border bridge for automotive traffic.
Thai officials said regular cross-border rail service is expected to be restored soon.
Thailand helped fund Cambodia’s rail line and will also hand over a train with four carriages.
Service between the two countries was suspended in the early 1970s when the track was destroyed during Cambodia’s civil war. Only in the late 1990s was security completely restored with the defeat of the Khmer Rouge.
Restoration work in Cambodia has already been completed from Poipet to the northwestern province of Sisophon, which has rail service to the capital, Phnom Penh.
There are plans to eventually offer service between Phnom Penh and the Thai capital, Bangkok, but there is not yet a schedule for reopening that route.
The connection would be integrated into regional plans to link most of mainland Southeast Asian from Kunming in southwestern China through the Southern Economic Corridor.
Hun Sen said at yesterday’s ceremony that the new rail connection would help develop both countries’ economies.
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