From 1961 to 1962, The Hague became the new setting for the Preah Vihear dispute
as Thai and Cambodian legal teams each argued their country’s case in front
of the ICJ. The determining factor in the trial was the legitimacy of the famous
Annex I map. The Cambodian delegation presented the map as evidence that the
temple had been situated within the borders of French Indochina, later Cambodia,
since 1907. Attorneys requested that the court should instruct Thailand to withdraw
its soldiers from the complex and recognize Cambodian sovereignty over
the site. In response, Thai attorneys argued that the map was solely the product of
France’s imagination, that it did not accurately depict the border region and had
never been accepted by Thailand. The international boundary had always been
the watershed of the Dangrek Mountains, as defined in the text of the 1904 Franco-
Siamese treaty. This would place the ruins in Thailand. After careful deliberation
on the legal and historical evidence, the court ruled 9–3 to recognize the Annex I
map as the final authority on the border demarcation instead of the treaty clause.
Bohdan Womarksi, President of the ICJ, gave his opinion that Thailand did indeed
accept the map as an official representation of the boundary, and had even
published additional copies for use in Thailand.80 Furthermore, if Thailand believed
the map to be in error, it had had multiple opportunities to protest its
inaccuracy at Franco-Thai negotiations in 1937 and 1946, but had not done so.81
Therefore the court awarded sovereignty over the site to Cambodia and instructed
Thailand to remove its soldiers from Preah Vihear.