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The parliamentary procedure was required by the Constitution's Article 190 prior to any negotiation with foreign countries that would involve changes in the territory.

Former foreign minister Noppadon Pattama lost his position after he signed a joint communique - without parliament's approval - supporting Phnom Penh's proposal to list the Preah Vihear Temple as a World Heritage Site.

Negotiation is a necessary means to settle the border dispute with Cambodia peacefully after border skirmishes killed three Cambodian soldiers and one Thai ranger in mid-October.

Despite the long delay, that is how parliamentary democracy transfers the people's mandate to the negotiators, said Virachai Plasai, director-general of Treaties and Legal Affairs, who is one of the Thai negotiators.

"From now, we can negotiate with Cambodia on behalf of 63 million Thais, not only the government," he said.

"Now, the Parliament backs me up as long as I negotiate under the approved framework," Virachai said.

Virachai, who was in Parliament on Tuesday during the debate on the negotiation framework, said he was impressed by the role of the parliamentarians, both government and opposition MPs.

"I think it is the right way our democracy works as all parliamentarians work together for the benefit of national interest," he said.

"There were some differences in ideas in detail but there is no divide between the government and the opposition while the general debate was very useful for negotiation," he said.

The parliament approved by an overwhelming majority the negotiating framework on the provisional arrangement and the negotiation framework of the Thai-Cambodian Joint Commission on Demarcation for Land Boundary (JBC).

The two frameworks would be instruments for two different purposes. The first one was for negotiations on troop redeployment and other arrangements at the Hindu temple of Preah Vihear and its vicinity while the other one authorised the JBC to negotiate on boundary demarcation.

The frameworks were basically based on a Memorandum of Understanding on the survey and demarcation of land boundary signed by both sides in 2000.

The framework for provisional arrangement is a short-term measure to settle the border troubles at the areas of the Preah Vihear Temple and its vicinity until the boundary there would be demarcated completely.

Its main task is to prevent further conflict and recurrence of border skirmish, Virachai said.

However, the provisional arrangement could not be activated immediately. It would take months to negotiate the text of the agreement with Cambodia before taking it back to Parliament for endorsement and ratification. After ratification, a temporary taskforce would be set up to handle the border arrangement at the Preah Vihear area.

Cambodia has already appointed Neng Phat as the head of its taskforce months ago while Thailand has no clear idea about the co-chair. As long as the Thai taskforce has not been set up, Thailand might modify the Regional Border Committee to do the job, according to Virachai.

The provisional arrangement might end up with at least an agreement but such a pact would not affect the territory, which is the task of the JBC.

The JBC would begin a new round of negotiations by mid-November and nobody should expect it could get the job done in a short period. Demarcation is a time-consuming work due to the difficulty of translating the text of the agreement into the boundary line on the ground.

Countries in Europe took a century to settle their border disputes. Thailand also has begun boundary demarcation with neighbouring countries long ago but had not finished yet. For instance, work has begun on demarcating the border with Laos after a military clash more than two decades ago. It has not been concluded yet.