In a letter sent to NOCC President Thong Khon and secretary general Vath Chamroeun, seen by insidethegames, the International Federation has asked why the NOCC "sees fit to disrespect and disregard the rightful, IOC recognised International Federation for the sport".

"It has unfortunately come to our attention that the Cambodian National Olympic Committee is seeking to work with an organisation that is not recognised by the International Olympic Committee, the Olympic Council of Asia, Global Association of International Sports Federations and is not a signatory of the World Anti-Doping Agency, as the sanctioning body for muay at the upcoming SEA Games in Cambodia," the letter written by IFMA secretary general Stephan Fox read.

"I also understand that the secretary general of the NOC of Cambodia is also the President of this organisation which, is an outright breach of good governance, serving as general secretary of an Olympic Committee committing actions which disregard the Olympic requirement to submit to the World Anti-Doping Code.

"It is very difficult for us to understand why the NOC of Cambodia sees fit to disrespect and disregard the rightful, IOC recognised International Federation for the sport, and how the secretary general would instead insist on granting the sanctioning authority to the unrecognised organisation of which he himself is the President."

According to the letter signed by Fox, "none of our member National Federations in Southeast Asia, whom are the sole member National Federation within the National Olympic Committee in their respective country will be permitted to participate in an event sanctioned by an organisation which is not part of the Olympic Movement.

"We have noted that the technical handbook that has been released by the Organising Committee of the Southeast Asian Games in Cambodia (CAMSOC) denotes the sport of kun khmer (muay).

"We would like to take this opportunity to clarify that as per article 34.4 of the Southeast Asian Games Federation Charter, the sport of muay is in category two. 

"As per Article 34.6, the adopted sport must belong to an existing International Sport Federation (IF), in the case of muay, this would be IFMA as the IOC recognised IF Kun Khmer is not included on the list of sports permitted on the programme as per article 34.4 of the SEAG Charter.

"Neither has the sport of kun khmer followed the criteria and rules for inclusion of new sports (Appendix 4 of the SEAG Charter)."

IFMA is planning to bring this matter to the attention of the IOC, the IOC Ethics Commission, the OCA, and the World Anti-Doping Agency.

"They opened their own muaythai federation," IFMA director general Charissa Tynan told insidethegames.

"The secretary general of NOCC is also the secretary general of this new federation.

"He wants to do his own thing and don’t want to follow IOC, WADA and OCA.

"We have already sent a letter to the IOC and the OCA.

"It is very difficult if the secretary general of NOCC does not want to follow the IOC Charter.

"As it stands today, we are not allowing any of our member federations to participate unless they are willing to use the recognised International Federation."

According to Tynan, despite multiple attempts to resolve the issue, NOCC has not responded to IFMA.

Cambodia is set to stage the SEA Games for the first time.

The Philippines had been scheduled to hold the 2023 Games, but they hosted the 2019 edition of the event instead after Brunei withdrew.

Cambodia participated in muaythai at the SEA Games in Malaysia in 2017, the Philippines in 2019 and Vietnam in 2021, which was held this year due to COVID-19 under the rightful umbrella organisation, IFMA.

Thailand, where the 2022 United Through Sports World Youth Festival is happening currently, is due to stage the 2025 SEA Games, under the sanctioning of IFMA.

The 2023 edition of SEA Games is scheduled to be held from May 5 to 17.

insidethegames has approached NOCC and the IOC for a comment.