Phnom Penh (VNA) – Cambodian border affairscommittee chairman Var Kimhong said the government will send newly-drawn Vietnam-Cambodia bordertopographic maps to the UN for internationalrecognition.

Speaking at the ceremony to hand over the maps to 35Cambodian ministries and state institutions at the Peace Palace, Phnom Penh onAugust 27, Var Kimhong considered the border topographic maps scaled at 1:25,000 as a “historic achievement” for Cambodia.

“We plan to send the topographic maps to be kept atthe United Nations,” he was quoted by Khmer Times as saying, adding that the Cambodiangovernment will negotiate with Vietnam to demarcate the remaining 16 percent ofthe border.

The map represented 84 percent of border demarcationwork completed between the two nations which have been implemented since 2006.

Kimhong said the maps were made based on the originalmaps of 1:100,000 scale produced during the French colonial era.

The handover ceremony took place under the presidencyof Samdech Pichey Sena Tea Banh, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of NationalDefence.

The map is an indispensable appendix to theVietnam-Cambodia land border demarcation protocol signed on October 5, 2019,and the supplementary treaty to the 1985 Treaty on the Delimitation of NationalBoundaries and the 2005 Supplementary Treaty.

On August 1, Vietnamese and Cambodian officialsexchanged border topographic maps at 1:25,000 scale at Moc Bai internationalborder gate in Vietnam’s southern province of Tay Ninh.

The Vietnamese delegation was led by Le Hoai Trung,Deputy Foreign Minister and Chairman of the Vietnam-Cambodia Joint Committee onBorder Demarcation and Marker Planting, while the Cambodian delegation washeaded by Var Kim Hong.

The two sides examined and agreed on all 500 sets ofborder topographic maps, including 250 in Vietnamese-Khmer languages and 250others in Khmer-Vietnamese languages, with signatures of the two countries’relevant authorities. Each side keeps 250 sets.

The event laid an important foundation for both sidesto hold a ceremony to exchange a document approving the validity of thesupplementary treaty to the 1985 Treaty on the Delimitation of NationalBoundaries and the 2005 Supplementary Treaty, and the Vietnam-Cambodia landborder demarcation protocol.

Both sides agreed to inform each other of the schedulefor the ceremony via diplomatic channels, after the two Governments endmeasures to prevent the spread of COVID-19.

Prime Minister Samdech Techo Hun Sen and hisVietnamese counterpart Nguyen Xuan Phuc signed an acknowledgement of bothcountries’ border marker planting, which achieved 84 percent, in Hanoi onOctober 5, 2019.

Cambodia and Vietnam share a border of 1,270 kilometres./.