more than a hundred were
wounded yesterday when Thai
soldiers used teargas and
automatic weapons to break up
antigovernment protests that
have brought chaos to the
streets of Bangkok.
The Thai Government said
that the deaths came after
fighting between the Red Shirt
antigovernment protesters and
enraged local people.
Last night the rioters had
been dislodged from several of
the roads that they had
occupied and were falling back
to barricades in front of
Government House, the central
focus of the protest. Abhisit
Vejjajiva, the Thai Prime
Minister, insisted that the
military campaign to curtail
the protesters was nearly
accomplished.
Organisers, however, were
mustering about 5,000
demonstrators for what they
called a last stand against
soldiers and riot police.
The British Government urged
travellers to avoid Bangkok and
consider cancelling travel
plans to other parts of
Thailand because of the “high
risk of further bloodshed”.
Bill Rammell, the Foreign
Office minister, said: “Today’s
reports of increasing tension
are of real concern.We do not
believe that violence has any
part to play in achieving
political aims and urge
restraint. British citizens are
warned not to travel to Bangkok
unless their visit is
absolutely essential and to
review their travel plans to
other parts of Thailand.”
Other governments issued
travel warnings, which will
have a devastating effect on
the tourist-dependent Thai
economy. Japan urged its
citizens to avoid wearing
clothes in red and yellow, the
colours of the opposing
factions in Thai politics.
As trucks carrying hundreds
of troops moved to a position
less than half a mile from
Government House, gunfire could
be heard and clouds of teargas
lingered in the air. In another
part of the city the building
housing the Education Ministry
was burning after reportedly
being petrol-bombed.
Mr Abhisit insisted that the
Government was trying to deal
with the crisis in a restrained
manner. “All the work I am
doing is not to create fear or
put pressure or to harm any
group of people,” he said on
national television. “It’s a
step-by-step process to restore
order and stop violence.”
Colonel Sansern Kaewkamnerd, an
army spokesman, said that
troops had fired live rounds
into the air but used blank
rounds when aiming directly at
the crowds.
Thaksin Shinawatra, the
former Thai Prime Minister, in
an interview with CNN from the
undisclosed location where he
lives in exile and who is
funding the protests, insisted
that there had been a massacre.
“Many people are dying,” he
said. “They even take the
bodies on the military trucks
and take them away . . .
They’re trying to confuse
everything.”
The citywide crackdown on
the Red Shirts began before
dawn when a key intersection in
Bangkok was cleared using
teargas and sprays of automatic
weapon fire. More than 70
people were wounded in the
raid.
Tourists staying in the
Century Park Hotel next to the
intersection were woken by the
gunfire. “I looked out of the
window and it was pandemonium,”
said Tommy Adams, a commercial
fitter from Paisley, near
Glasgow. “The soldiers were
advancing in an orderly way and
firing into the air. The Red
Shirts were fleeing. I was
scared that they would try and
flee into the hotel.”
Later the Red Shirts at the
intersection set fire to a
commandeered public bus and set
it rolling in the direction of
the soldiers. The soldiers then
fired into the air and pushed
forward as a monk pleaded for
calm, crying: “Don’t shoot,
don’t shoot.”
Several protesters were
arrested and stripped of their
shirts, and attempts to
blockade the Victory Monument
roundabout were foiled.
The Thai military chased
protesters from other key
points in the city, leaving the
rally near Government House,
where thousands of protesters
including women and children
had gathered behind barricades,
as the centre of resistance. A
senior military spokesman said
that the strategy was to
confine the protesters to
Government House and prevent
others from joining them.
The decisive action was in
marked contrast to the
military’s passive response at
the weekend, when the Red
Shirts were effectively
permitted to invade the venue
of a conference, sending world
leaders fleeing and humiliating
Mr Abhisit.
“This will be our final
stand,” Jatuporn Phromphan, the
Red Shirt leader, told the
crowd from a makeshift stage
close to Government House. “I
beg that you return here and
face them together. We will use
peaceful means and stay right
here to end their
violence.”
