The army crackdown in Bangkok has left at least five people dead on Wednesday [Reuters]
Buildings across Bangkok have been set ablaze by red shirt protesters after the Thai military stormed a protest camp in the centre of the city.
Six key leaders of the red shirt movement surrendered to police after Thai soldiers breached barricades surrounding the camp early on Wednesday.
But rather than surrender, some of their followers set several buildings in the Thai capital on fire, destroying a major department store and trapping employees of the Channel Three television station in their burning office building.
Authorities said 100 people were trapped inside the television building. A spokesman for the Bangkok fire department said that a fire engine attempting to put out the blaze was attacked by protesters and forced to retreat.
Fire was also reported at the Bangkok stock exchange, while the Central World Department store, the second largest department store in Southeast Asia, has been destroyed in a blaze.
The city was engulfed in thick black smoke on Wednesday afternoon as emergency services attempted to bring the fires under control.
Curfew imposed
The Thai government has imposed a curfew on Bangkok from 8pm (1300GMT) to 6am (2300GMT) in an effort to re-establish control over the streets. It said military operations would continue overnight.
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Wednesday's offensive came after days of escalating clashes and street battles as the Thai government stepped up pressure on the red shirts to end more than two months of crippling protests.
At least five people are known to have died in Wednesday's assault, but that number could rise further. The unfolding situation in the capital has also triggered unrest in the north of country, with a town hall in Udon Thani stormed by protesters and set ablaze.
The violence follows earlier hopes that the surrender of red shirt leaders would mark the end of the standoff.
Speaking earlier on Wednesday, Panitan Wattanayagorn, spokesman for the Thai government, said red shirt leaders had accepted what he called a "road map" to reconciliation and most of the areas occupied by the protesters were secure.
News of the leaders' surrender on Wednesday afternoon also coincided with reports of further grenade explosions in and around the red shirt camp.
Other red shirt leaders issued emotional calls for demonstrators to leave central Bangkok, even though pockets of resistance remain.
Earlier Thai soldiers and armoured personnel carriers punched through red shirt barricades and moved into the main encampment of anti-government protesters in Bangkok.
Army crackdown
Al Jazeera's Wayne Hay, reporting from inside the breached protest site, said troops moved quickly through the first kilometre of the protest site, towards the main stage where the leaders of the so-called red shirts were believed to be.
At least two bodies – suspected to be killed red shirt guards - were seen being removed from the area, our correspondent said, and the Thai Red Cross has appealed for blood donations.
Jongjet Aoajenpong, the director of Police hospital, was quoted by the AFP news agency as saying that an Italian journalist was shot in the stomach and "died before arriving at the hospital".
Protesters lit fuel-soaked tyre barricades in an attempt to defend their camp [AFP]
About 100 soldiers armed with automatic rifles and shotguns, along with several machine gun mounted armoured personnel carriers, breached the red shirts' barricade at the southern end of their protest site on Wednesday.
The armoured vehicles had repeatedly rammed the barricade made up largely of tyres, sharpened bamboo poles and razor wire before breaking through the flattened structure.
Before the assault began, troops used loudspeakers to tell protesters at the protest site in Bangkok's high-end Rachaprasong shopping district to go home, saying their lives were in danger.
Thaksin warning
Thaksin Shinawatra, the ousted Thai prime minister whom many of the red shirts support, said he feared a military crackdown could lead to guerrilla warfare across the country.
"There is a theory saying a military crackdown can spread resentment and these resentful people will become guerrillas," Thaksin told the Reuters news agency by telephone.
As the military moved on the red shirt camp, the government said it would offer safe passage to unarmed, civilian protesters after moving into the protest camp and said buses were waiting to send them home.
The authorities had warned the red shirts to leave their protest site by 3pm (0800 GMT) on Monday, saying that those who remained faced two years in prison.
However, the protesters defied the order and the deadline passed without any action being taken.
Wednesday's military operation comes after the government rejected holding further negotiations with the red shirts until they left their rally site.
A mediation proposal, floated by a group of 64 senators in the 150-member upper house of the Thai parliament on Tuesday, was accepted by the protesters but rejected by Abhisit Vejjajiva, the prime minister.
Satit Wonghnongtaey, a government minister, said while Abhisit welcomed negotiations, the government insisted "talks will happen only after the protest has ended".
The crisis, which began when demonstrations were launched in mid-March, has now left around 70 people dead and about 1,700 wounded.
Envisioning a Peau Thai Government Posted on June 30, 2011 by admin
[This is an excerpt from a report originally written on June 27, 2011.]
Assuming a Peau Thai win, there are two possible outcomes: a Peau Thai-led government or a government much like the one now—with the Democrats as a leading party and perhaps a compromise PM like Sanan. There are many permutations of these two outcomes and many ways the establishment can block Peau Thai, but it essentially boils down to these two options.
The deciding factor is military confidence that they can brave the immediate street protests that would ensue if Peau Thai is blocked from power.
The Democrats, as is their style, have apparently run a very conservative and ineffective campaign. The recent Democrat rally pointing out the links between the Peau Thai and violent Red Shirts probably increased Peau Thai popularity. This is because the Thai inclination is to feel sorry for any party (rightly accused or otherwise) who are being put at a disadvantage. With the Peau Thai apparently surging, it is possible that the military would take the path of least resistance and allow Peau Thai to form a government.
In 2008 the last Thaksin-directed party came to power, but failed to gain both momentum and legitimacy since it refused to govern until constitutional amendment absolving Thaksin were passed. We would expect Peau Thai to not repeat the mistakes of 2008, but try to take power as a normal government and legislate—gaining both legitimacy and popularity—particularly if they make it clear that policies and direction of the government were coming from Thaksin.
With the military on edge about Thaksin intent towards it and the highest institution, this might be the best strategy for the Peau Thai—build legitimacy and popularity as a base to eventually declare reconciliation has been achieved. Then measures could begin which would include the exoneration of Thaksin. The Peau Thai have every reason to play nice—meanwhile the establishment faces many uncertainties.
A Peau Thai government would be a bitter and frightening pill to swallow for many. The same Red Shirt leaders who besieged Bangkok and called on the city to be burned are high on the Peau Thai Party list and will certainly become MPs. The political opposition and the media will be wary of a return to the past when the media was pressured to praise the government and those who criticized the government came under constant threat of libel suits.
The top military and police brass will be feeling uncertain and must be pre-planning their responses to surprise replacement orders from the government. Twice annual military reshuffles would once again become the occasion for bitter recriminations and occasional violence as pro-Thaksin figures are reshuffled back into top positions. Most coups have taken place because those in these groups feared being replaced and acted proactively to prevent it.
During the People Power Party year in power in 2008, anti-monarchy statements were repeatedly made at Red Shirt rallies as the government was trying to pressure the establishment on absolving Thaksin. Expect this sort of tact to continue if things heat up.
A Peau Thai government means much less immediate chaos, but instead a long, drawn out struggle including legal and procedural challenges to mute the government’s power. Military pressure on coalition parties could be used to force a government collapse at a key time (and perhaps trigger a re-formed government with the Democrats leading again).
Thailand's Department of Special Investigation (DSI) has been evacuated after about 2,000 protesters surrounded the building on Wednesday.
The department's director general Tharit Pengdit says the evacuation took place after an attempt by protestors to shut down key government buildings and ministries.
The DSI is Thailand's equivalent of the US Federal Bureau of Investigation.
It is one of several state offices that demonstrators are targeting in hope of toppling Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra's government.
The anti-government protesters, led by former deputy prime minister Suthep Thaugsuban, chanted abuse at the DSI as scores of riot police scrambled to put on helmets and hold up shields as crowds pushed against a low fence.
The DSI shares the compound with important government agencies, including tax, revenue, immigration and land departments.
Some employees were seen leaving their offices and joining the protests.
Ongoing protests
Five ministries in the capital have been evacuated in the past two days and protesters are occupying the Finance Ministry.
About 3,000 people gathered at the Energy Ministry, 700 at the Commerce Ministry and 200 at the Industry Ministry, according to police reports.
Provincial rallies ranged from 20 people in Narathiwat to 4,000 in Surat Thani, Mr Suthep's political base.
Most of the 19 provinces where demonstrators had massed are in the south, a traditional stronghold of the opposition Democrat Party.
But four were in the north and northeast, where former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra and his family is hugely popular.
The target of Wednesday's rallies was to shut down the bureaucracy to wipe out the "political machine of Thaksin", Mr Suthep said.
The protests, though peaceful, have raised fears of unrest.
Anti-government protest leaders, from all sides, have a tradition in Thailand of trying to provoke a violent crackdown by the government to rob it of its legitimacy.
The DSI recently indicted Mr Suthep and former prime minister Abhisit Vejjajiva for murder for their alleged role in the deaths of more than 90 people in 2010 in a military crackdown on demonstrations by Thaksin's supporters.
One demonstrator Chattavorn Sangsuwan says while the DSI is "supposed to be an independent organization", it has "not acted neutrally".
"We will finish off what the coup-makers started in 2006. Their job was not complete, Thaksin's influence is still everywhere. We are here to finish the job," he said.
The demonstrations have been going on for weeks but are gaining momentum.
Thaksin: a controversial figure
Such protests are familiar in Thailand, which has seen eight years of on-off turmoil, from crippling street protests to controversial judicial rulings and military intervention, each time with Thaksin at the centre of the disputes.
Despite fleeing into exile to dodge a jail sentence for abuse of power in 2008, Thaksin, a former telecommunications mogul, has loomed large over Thai politics.
He won the support of the rural poor who voted him twice into office, in 2001 and 2005, before he was ousted in a 2006 military coup.
His supporters remain fiercely loyal to him and the parties he backs.
While his opponents are fewer in number, they hold considerable power and influence especially over the urban middle class.
Many of them see Thaksin as a corrupt, crony capitalist who manipulates the masses with populist handouts and is a threat to the monarchy, which he denies.
Yingluck responds
Prime Minister Yingluck says the police will keep the peace as there is fear that clashes could erupt and further weaken her government.
"My government will not use force. This is not the 'Thaksin regime', this is a democratically-elected government," she told reporters outside parliament, where she is being grilled by opposition lawmakers in a two-day confidence debate.
The anti-government campaign started last month after Yingluck's ruling Puea Thai Party tried to pass an amnesty bill that critics said was designed to absolve Thaksin of his graft 2008 conviction.
Thailand's Senate rejected the bill, but that did nothing to defuse the crisis.
A spokesperson for the protestors Akanat Promphan says they "don't want any confrontation".
"We will ask civil servants to join the people, to stop working for the Thaksin system," he said.
BANGKOK: The battle for who holds Thailand’s seat of power took on a new twist today as the leader of anti-government protests planned to set up his office at the vacated Government House while the country’s new caretaker leader worked from a makeshift, suburban outpost.
The development was the latest to highlight the government’s lack of power as Thailand’s political crisis grinds into its seventh month. One newspaper compared the political situation to a sinking ship that it called the “Thaitanic.”
Protest leader Suthep Thaugsuban, who has led the movement for six months, has called for a “final push” to install an unelected new prime minister — a goal that critics call undemocratic but supporters say is a necessary step for implementing anti-corruption reforms before a new election can take place.
Suthep planned to end a months-long occupation of the city’s main park today and march his followers across Bangkok to the prime minister’s office compound, called Government House, which has been vacant for months due to violent clashes between protesters and police nearby.
Suthep says he will not occupy the actual prime minister’s office inside the compound’s stately Gothic-style main building but will base himself in the adjacent Santi Maitree Building traditionally used for state visits. In more stable times, the building was used for meetings with dignitaries such as President Barack Obama and Myanmar’s opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
There was no apparent resistance to Suthep’s plan. The military that provides security at Government House said over the weekend he would be allowed in to avoid further clashes in a crisis that has left more than 20 dead and hundreds injured since November.
Protesters achieved one of their goals last week when the Constitutional Court dismissed Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra for nepotism in a case that many viewed as politically motivated.
Analysts, protesters and Thai media agree that the ruling did little to resolve the country’s political turmoil.
“Every so often, the stewards of the nation rearrange the deck chairs, as `Thaitanic’ continues to plough relentlessly further into uncharted territory, without a captain,” The Bangkok Post newspaper said in a Sunday editorial. “The ship is still heading right for that iceberg.”
Protesters had been calling for Yingluck’s ouster but say her removal is not enough, and they want to set up an unelected “people’s council” to implement still-undefined reforms to combat corruption and money politics. They oppose elections scheduled for July, which the current ruling party would likely win.
Yingluck’s Cabinet has named deputy premier Niwattumrong Boonsongpaisan as acting prime minister, but protesters say he doesn’t hold the authority and status to be the head of the government.
Like Yingluck, he is forced to work out of the Office to the Permanent Secretary for Defence in the unfashionable suburb of Muang Thong Thani. Niwattumrong was to hold his first news conference with the foreign media later today as the crisis continues to batter the country’s image, its tourism industry and overall economy.
Yingluck’s supporters have warned that any attempt to install an unelected prime minister would be a disaster for the nation that could spark “civil war.”
Both supporters and opponents are holding large rallies in the Thai capital, which have raised concerns of violence.
The Senate was also holding a meeting today to discuss the crisis following a controversial proposal by Suthep for the presidents of the top courts and the Election Commission to work together to appoint a new leader.
Thailand’s long-running political crisis began in 2006, when Yingluck’s brother, former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, was toppled by a military coup after being accused of corruption, abuse of power and disrespect for King Bhumibol Adulyadej.
Thaksin, a former telecommunications billionaire, remains highly popular among the rural poor in Thailand’s north and northeast, and parties controlled by him have won every national election since 2001. The anti-government protesters, aligned with the opposition Democrat Party, say they want to remove all traces of his political machine from politics. --AP
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