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BANGKOK (Reuters) - Thai authorities have arrested and charged a U.S. citizen with insulting the country's revered monarchy, the latest of a growing number of people accused of breaching the world's toughest lese-majeste laws.
The Department of Special Investigation (DSI), Thailand's equivalent of the FBI in the United States, said Thai-born Lerpong Wichaikhammat, 55, had translated an article deemed offensive to the monarchy and posted it on his blog.
He was also accused of providing a web link to a controversial biography by an American author of 83-year-old King Bhumibiol Adulyadej, a book banned in Thailand.
Lese-majeste, or insulting the monarchy, is a very serious offence in Thailand, where many people regard King Bhumibol as almost divine. Each offence is punishable by up to 15 years in prison. The latest alleged offences also contravened the country's Computer Crimes Act, the DSI said.
"He denied all charges and we are preparing the case to submit to the court for prosecution," DSI Chief Tharit Pengdith told Reuters.
Critics say the law is being abused to discredit opposition activists and politicians, who mostly deny pursuing a republican agenda. The number of complaints, especially those lodged by the military, has jumped ahead of a July 3 parliamentary election.
I was not arrested.
obama may be taking notes! Must not offend the divine you know.
obama may be taking notes! Must not offend the divine you know.
Alot of countries actually have rules like that, I know if you are in the Middle East you can be arrested if you insult the Emirs of countries like Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Oman etc
Thailands main opposition Pheu Thai party dominated Sundays nationwide election, the first in four years. The contest was mainly between the ruling Democrats of Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva and the opposition Pheu Thai, led by Yingluck Shinawatra, the younger sister of former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra. Even before official results were in, exit polls indicated Pheu Thai won a comfortable majority of seats in parliament.
The victory marks a dramatic political reversal for Thaksin and his allies nearly five years after he was forced from power in a military coup. Abhisit accepted defeat and congratulated Yingluck Shinawatra on national television, welcoming her as Thailands first female prime minister. But he said the Democrats would continue to oppose Pheu Thais plan to grant amnesty to politicians, including Thaksin. He says they worked very hard for more than two years and he wants to thank everyone. From today, he says, he wishes to see unity, reconciliation, and for the new government to do as promised. He says the Democrats will be a constructive opposition party in the parliament, but will oppose any attempt to grant amnesty to any individuals.
Yingluck is widely viewed as a proxy for her brother who, despite being twice popularly elected, was ousted by the military in 2006 over concerns he was growing too powerful. Thaksin Shinawatra has spoken out on the election results from Dubai. As VOA's Ira Mellman report, he discussed his possible future involvement in the new government, but said he is in no hurry to return to Thailand.
Thaksin critics say he was corrupt, authoritarian, and disloyal to Thailands revered monarchy. He denies all the charges and in 2008 fled into exile to avoid a jail sentence for corruption. Nonetheless, in the past four general elections Thailand voted overwhelmingly for Thaksin or parties aligned with him. But controversial court orders dissolved those governments for election fraud and banned their leaders from office for five years.
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The head of the party, Pheu Thai, and likely prime minister is Yingluck Shinawatra, 44, the youngest sister of Mr. Thaksin, who was ousted in a coup in 2006 now lives in Dubai evading a jail term for abuse of power. Preliminary results showed Pheu Thai with 264 seats, more than half the total of 500 and enough to form a single-party government. The incumbent prime minster, Abhisit Vejjajiva, resigned on Monday as head of the Democrat Party, which won only 160 seats. He promised to play a constructive role in opposition.
The election commission said it was investigating accusations of electoral fraud that could disqualify some candidates and affect the size of the Pheu Thai victory. It said it would announce the final tally within 30 days. With both electoral and political challenges in view, Pheu Thai immediately began negotiating with parties that could add to the governments total and offer safety in numbers. Referring to the total of coalition seats, Ms. Yingluck said at a news conference: Two hundred ninety-nine is a beautiful number.
A businesswoman with no political experience, Ms. Yingluck would become Thailands first female prime minister. After her victory she denied that she would simply be a front for her brother. There is a lot of work ahead - tackling economic woes and leading the country on the path of reconciliation, she said. These tasks fall upon me. At the news conference, she said her governments priorities would be economic development and reconciliation, an undefined term that was also used by the outgoing Democrat Party during its divisive period in power.
Corruption is another problem we will solve, she said, repeating a campaign promise that also echoed the pledges of earlier governments. She repeated her partys denial of a policy she had stated at the beginning of her campaign: a political amnesty that would pave the way for the eventual return of Mr. Thaksin, the most divisive figure in Thai politics. The vote was s a vindication for Mr. Thaksin, 61, a populist champion of Thailands long-marginalized rural poor, who was elected prime minister twice, in 2001 and 2005, and removed in a coup in September 2006.
More http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/05/world/asia/05thailand.html
The election marked an extraordinary rebuke of the military-backed establishment that deposed Thaksin in a coup five years ago, and the opposition's strong mandate in parliament was likely to boost stability in the short-term a fact reflected in a sharp rise in the Thai stock market Monday. Thaksin's overthrow in 2006 triggered years of political unrest in the Southeast Asian kingdom, including mass street protests launched by Thaksin's supporters last year that were crushed in a bloody army crackdown.
Defense Minister Gen. Prawit Wongsuwon said the army would accept a government led by Thaksin's sister, 44-year-old Yingluck Shinawatra, and vowed the military would not stage a coup. "I've said this several times," Prawit was quoted as saying by several Thai newspapers Monday. "We are not going to intervene." Yingluck announced an agreement Monday to form a five-party coalition government. Her Pheu Thai party won a majority of 265 seats in the 500-seat lower house of parliament outright, according to preliminary results of Sunday's polling; Yingluck said the agreement with four minor parties would boost her coalition to 299 seats.
The accord came unusually quickly for Thai politics, where hard bargaining usually takes place over allocation of Cabinet seats. The pact should strengthen Yingluck's government-to-be, especially if legal challenges under electoral law force some of her party's lawmakers from their positions. The army-backed incumbent Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, meanwhile, resigned as leader of the outgoing ruling party, Democrat Party spokesman Buranaj Smutharaks told The Associated Press. The Democrats won 159 seats. Exiled political analyst Giles Ji Ungpakorn called the election results "a slap in the face for the dictatorship."
"They prove without any doubt that the majority of people have rejected the military, the Democrat party and the royalist elite," Giles said in a statement from Britain. Yingluck told reporters that the first mission of her administration would be: "how to lead the country to unity and reconciliation." "I myself, and Pheu Thai, are determined to serve the nation," Yingluck said, adding that her government would boost transparency and fight corruption. Thaksin, her billionaire brother, was convicted of graft and lives in exile in Dubai to escape a two-year-prison sentence. Thaksin says the charges are politically motivated.
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The woman set to become Thailand's first female prime minister, Yingluck Shinawatra, said Monday that authorities will reopen an investigation into her brother, former Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, who was convicted of corruption after being forced from office. Yingluck Shinawatra's Pheu Thai party dominated the country's general election on Sunday, winning 265 seats in the 500-member parliament. It was a major victory for the party once headed by her brother, who was exiled after a military coup threw him from power in 2006. He left the country two years later, after he was convicted of conflict of interest charges. He was sentenced in absentia to two years' imprisonment.
In her first one-on-one interview with an international media organization after all the votes had been counted, Shinawatra told CNN's Sara Sidner she would not encourage her brother, who lives in Dubai, to return to Thailand to serve his sentence. She said she did not know whether her brother was wrongly convicted but that a truth and reconciliation commission plans to review the case against him and several others. Thaksin Shinawatra, meanwhile, spoke Monday about his sister's status as the country's next prime minister. "I'm proud of her and I trust her," he told reporters in the United Arab Emirates.
When asked whether he expects his sister to clear the way for his return, the former prime minister said, "Going back home is not a major concern. It's not a top priority. The priority is to bring back reconciliation." Many hope that Sunday's general election -- the first since 2007 -- will bring an end to years of unrest between two political factions that climaxed last year with deadly protests. Tensions between the Democratic Party and the Pheu Thai party, which reflect deep divisions within Thai society, erupted in 2010, with protests against Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva's government leading to a military crackdown. More than 90 people were killed and hundreds were injured. After the riots, the Thai government pledged to work toward a process of national reconciliation to heal class and political divisions, though the divide between the two groups remains wide.
The other coalition parties include Chart Thai Pattana, Chart Pattana Puea Pandin, Palang Chon and Mahachon. "Now we have a good number of 299 representatives," Yingluck Shinawatra said. "It is enough to have stability to serve (the) Thai people." Thailand's Democratic Party won 159 of the seats, the country's electoral commission said Monday, though the final, official results have not been released. Abhisit, the prime minister, announced he is stepping down as the head of the Democratic Party after its loss at the polls. "When compared with the result of (the) election in 2007 with this year's election, we have less MPs," Abhisit said via the Thai news agency MCOT. "I think that I need to take this responsibility, so today I decided to resign from the leader position of the (Democratic) party, and I will let the party choose a new leader in 90 days." Yingluck Shinawatra said Monday that reconciliation is "the urgent task ahead." She has also vowed that her first priority would be to "help people on their economic situation."
More Incoming Thai PM: Case against Thaksin and others to be reviewed - CNN.com
obama may be taking notes! Must not offend the divine you know.
