Thailand's cabinet has formally cancelled a 2001 memorandum of understanding with Cambodia — known as MoU 44 — that provided a framework for joint oil and gas exploration and maritime boundary talks in the Gulf of Thailand's contested Overlapping Claims Area, a 26,000-square-kilometre zone believed to hold significant hydrocarbon reserves. Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul, who made scrapping the deal a campaign pledge before his re-election earlier this year, cited 25 years of stalled negotiations, though the move follows armed border clashes between the two countries in 2025 that displaced hundreds of thousands of people. Cambodia condemned the withdrawal as a departure from the spirit of peaceful resolution and said it would now pursue compulsory conciliation under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, while both leaders are expected to meet on the sidelines of the ASEAN Summit in Cebu, Philippines, this week.