Cambodian and Thai officials held talks to prevent fresh fighting on their border Sunday after tensions over disputed land around an ancient temple flared into deadly gunbattles.

A third Thai soldier died in hospital following Friday’s clashes, which rattled relations between the neighbours just days before a regional summit that was supposed to focus on the global economic slowdown.

Military officials from both sides met over lunch in disputed territory near the 11th-century Preah Vihear temple on Sunday, while Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen was set to meet Thai officials later in the capital Phnom Penh.

“We held the meeting in order to make the situation return to normal and to make sure there’s no more gunfire. We have agreed to stay on our sides of the border,” Cambodian Major General Srey Doek said after the talks.

His Thai counterpart, Major General Kanok Netrak Thavesanak, said that in future both sides would “communicate to solve problems. Sometimes there are misunderstandings.”

Troops could be seen chatting and some even stowed away their weapons but they said they remained ready to fight after their clash, the biggest burst of violence over the territory since four people died there in October.

However journalists were barred from entering the so-called Eagle Area, which has seen the most violence, because the Cambodian military said it remained too tense.

Decades of tensions over ownership of the site started to boil over after Cambodia successfully applied for United Nations world heritage status for the ruins in July.

Kanok, the Thai officer, said an official from his country would meet later with Hun Sen.

“A Thai official is going to meet with the Cambodian prime minister today and they will talk about the clashes that happened two days earlier,” Cambodian cabinet spokesman Phay Siphan told AFP.

Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva meanwhile said that the issue would come up when he meets his Cambodian counterpart at a summit of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and its regional partners in Thailand next week.

“This will be raised in next week’s meeting to find a solution to the problem,” Abhisit said in his weekly television broadcast, adding that the two countries would “resume the talking process as soon as possible.”

Pre-arranged talks on the border situation, the latest in a series that have been held over the past six months, are also set to go ahead as planned on Monday and Tuesday in Phnom Penh.

The Thai and Cambodian leaders both sought to play down the latest crisis on Saturday, saying that it was the result of a misunderstanding and that the two countries were not at war.

“It’s like next-door neighbours — when their chickens fight, the owners get into a dispute too,” Hun Sen said.

But while tensions had noticeably eased at the border on Sunday, Cambodian soldiers said they would fight to the death to protect the ancient temple perched on a forested cliff overlooking green swathes of countryside.

“We are not afraid of Thai soldiers. Everything happened because Thai soldiers want to take our temple and land,” said Cambodian soldier Chum Chuon.

Friday’s violence damaged a government office and destroyed a local market.

Hundreds of Cambodians who lost their homes in the fighting were evacuated to a school 20 kilometres (12 miles) away and were being provided new plots of land further from disputed territory.

In 1962 an international court awarded the ruins to Cambodia, but the most accessible entrance is in Thailand and the two countries still dispute ownership of the surrounding land.

The border in the area is poorly defined, partly because it is heavily mined after decades of conflict in Cambodia.

AFP: Cambodia, Thailand in talks after border clashes