Bangkok Crippled & Government Offices Seized

Bangkok Crippled & Government Offices Seized

By Richard S. Ehrlich

BANGKOK, Thailand -- In the biggest anti-government street protest in
years, tens of thousands of people crippled Bangkok on Monday (Nov.
25), storming and occupying the foreign and finance ministries, and
swarming around military, police and other buildings, demanding the
elected prime minister resign.

"I invite protesters to stay here overnight at the Finance Ministry,"
tough-talking protest leader Suthep Thaugsuban told hundreds of
supporters who began arranging their sleeping mats on floors inside
the multi-story building.

"I urge other protesters to do the same and seize other government
buildings and offices around the country," Mr. Suthep said.

"I have no intention to resign or dissolve the House," Prime Minister
Yingluck Shinawatra told reporters in response.

"The cabinet can still function, even though we are facing some
difficulties. All sides have shown their political aims, now they must
turn to face each other and talk, in order to find a peaceful way out
for the country."

Police said the protesters occupying the Finance Ministry's Budget
Bureau and Auditor General's Office would face prosecution.

The mob told officials in both buildings to get out, officials said.
Electric power was then cut off, but it was unclear who pulled the
plug.

Some protesters said they would occupy the buildings throughout Monday
night and the next day as part of their massive street protests to
force Mrs. Yingluck to resign.

Meanwhile, a rival rally by tens of thousands of pro-government Red
Shirt supporters gathered in a Bangkok sports stadium, vowing to pour
into the streets if Mrs. Yingluck is toppled by the protesters or a
coup.

Mrs. Yingluck was elected to head the ruling coalition in July 2011
because she was a younger sister of Thaksin Shinawatra who was ousted
in a bloodless 2006 military coup despite winning three elections.

"Tomorrow we will seize all ministries to show to the Thaksin system
that they have no legitimacy to run the country," announced protest
leader Suthep, the frustrated opposition's former deputy prime
minister and minister for security affairs.

The anti-Thaksin protesters fear Mrs. Yingluck is orchestrating Mr.
Thaksin's return from self-exile abroad by trying to arrange an
"amnesty" to lift his two-year jail sentence.

That punishment was imposed by a post-coup court for Mr. Thaksin's
alleged conflict of interest on a Bangkok real estate deal involving
his then-wife.

Mr. Thaksin also wants about two billion U.S. dollars of his cash and
assets returned, which another post-coup court seized because he had
profited from a tax-free telecommunications deal.

Unfortunately for the street protesters, their leaders have been
unable to win any popular elections to form a government, so they are
now massing to force Mrs. Yingluck's coalition to implode.

The protestors also oppose Mrs. Yingluck's attempts to allow the
Senate to be fully elected, as is the House of Representatives in the
bicameral Parliament.

After the coup, Thailand's constitution was trashed and a new charter
was drawn up which allowed about 50 percent of Senate to be
appointed.

Mrs. Yingluck's supporters say the protest movement's attempt to
overthrow the government by allegedly manipulating appointed officials
-- including senators, the military, judges and others -- proves that
it opposes democracy.

Backed by her brother, Mrs. Yingluck insists she will not be
threatened by the protests which topped 100,000 people in Bangkok on
Sunday (Nov. 24).

Mr. Thaksin however is tarred by acts of repression committed during
his 2001-2006 administration, when he oversaw a vicious "war on drugs"
which allegedly resulted in the extrajudicial killing of about 2,500
people without trial.

Also during Mr. Thaksin's government, the military killed more than 70
minority Muslim men in the south by tying them up and laying them
horizontal on top of each other in an army truck, resulting in their
suffocation.

Under Mr. Thaksin, the military also attacked Krue Se mosque in the
south, killing scores of people who were inside amid fears that they
were insurgents involved in an Islamist guerrilla war which has raged
since 2004, resulting in more than 4,500 people killed on all sides.

The current protests are led by Mr. Suthep and Abhisit Vejjajiva who
became prime minister in 2008 but lost the 2011 election to Mrs.
Yingluck.

Both men are now being investigated for alleged murder committed
during their administration when they presided over the military's
crackdown in 2010 against a nine-week, pro-Thaksin street
insurrection, resulting in more than 90 deaths -- most of them
pro-Thaksin civilians.

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