The United Nations Security Council will convene a special session to try to prevent a border dispute between Thailand and Cambodia from escalating into a military confrontation.

Diplomats said Wednesday the session probably would be held next week after Cambodia appealed to the U.N. for help. The Association of South East Asian Nations, or ASEAN, declined a Cambodian request to help resolve the dispute after Thailand objected.

The conflict focuses on an area both nations claim as their own and that is less than 2 square miles around the Preah Vihear temple, which an international court awarded to Cambodia in 1962.

Thai troops killed Cambodian refugees there in 1979, and its listing this month as a U.N. World Heritage Site stirred tensions in Thailand.