• by Marwaan Macan-Markar (bangkok)
• Friday, September 24, 2010
• Inter Press Service

A landmark political trial begins on Monday when leaders of an anti-government protest movement, known as the ‘red shirts’, will be hauled before the criminal court to face alleged terrorism charges.

The 19 accused include Veera Musikapong, leader of the United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship (UDD), as the red shirts called their movement, and other key figures, such Nattawut Saikua, Weng Tochirakarn and Korkaew Piukulthong.

Seventeen of the 19 have been languishing in the Bangkok Remand Prison, north of the Thai capital, for four months.

'There has never been a case like this before in Bangkok,' Karom Poltaklang, a lawyer for the red shirt leaders, told IPS. 'It is unclear how the court will proceed with this case.'

The first hearing of this politically charged trial at the criminal court on Sep. 27 will see defence lawyers submitting a list of witnesses before the court.

It comes over a month after the 17 red shirt leaders were brought to court, barefoot and shackled in leg irons, to be slapped with terrorism charges, to which they all pleaded not guilty.

The Thai government accuses the UDD’s leaders of committing acts of terrorism during the street protests they held in two iconic parts of Bangkok from mid-March till mid-May 2010. The protests, which drew tens of thousands of red shirt followers from rural Thailand, were brought to an end following two bloody crackdowns, which left 91 people killed, a majority of them civilians, and close to 1,900 people injured.

The red shirts, who wear their signature crimson attire in their rallies, responded with rage following the final assault by armed Thai troops on May 19. In fleeing their encampment in the heart of an upscale shopping district, they left a trail of burnt buildings here in the capital and in several other provinces.

For its part, the government of Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva has made few attempts to clear the air about the high death toll among protesters. It has pointed the finger at a shadowy group of armed ‘black shirts’, who were seen firing from behind red shirt lines during the April and May military crackdowns.

The Abhisit administration’s ability to gain this upper hand — including the trial of the Bangkok 19 — stems from the emergency decree that has been in place since early April. This decree, aimed at keeping a lid on the UDD, is still in force in seven areas including Bangkok, where soldiers have been a visible presence in recent weeks.

The nexus between the government and the powerful army has also undermined the Abhisit administration’s claims to upholding democratic values, critics say.

'Despite reports that hundreds of people have been detained and interrogated under the Emergency Decree in locations controlled by security forces, the CRES (Centre for the Resolution of Emergency Situations) has so far failed to provide information about the exact number of those detained and their current whereabouts to their families,' said Human Rights Watch (HRW), the New York-based global rights lobby, in a statement released Thursday.

The CRES is a military-dominated body set up by the government to target the UDD — whose key demand for an early general election. It has been described by some analysts as 'state within a state.'

The terrorism charges, say Thai legal experts, stems from this power. 'The Abhisit government called the leaders of the red shirts terrorists, and the police merely charged them accordingly,' said Somchai Preecha-silpakul, former dean of the law faculty at Chiang Mai University, based in northern Thailand. 'Using the law like this is very dangerous when the government uses the charge against its opponents.'

'It will allow anyone to use the law and call their opponents ‘terrorists’,' he warned during an IPS interview.

The political nature of the trial, which highlights the deep divisions in this South-east Asian kingdom, is inviting comparison with a legal case involving 18 student leaders that took place over three decades ago. That 1976 case also took place in an era of deep political polarisation.

'This kind of case involving the red shirt leaders is very rare historically in Thailand,' said David Streckfuss, a U.S. academic specialising in Thai political culture. 'There hasn’t been any case like this in recent Thai politics.'

'It is reminiscent of the 1976 case involving 18 student leaders, who faced a litany of charges — communism, terrorism and lese majeste,' he told IPS. 'Those cases were resolved when a less oppressive government gave a general amnesty.'

But for the supporters of the jailed red shirt leaders who gather every morning at Bangkok’s Remand Prison, what matters given the approaching trial is to boost the spirits of their 'political heroes'.

'We talk with them and say they have to keep fighting,' said Nanthiya Nomkhoksoona, a 51-year-old Bangkok resident who joins a morning procession of close to 100 red shirts to meet the likes of the jailed Nattawut and Weng. 'These are all political charges that have been brought against them by the government to silence the red shirts.'

'They think they are innocent and will use the case to prove it,' added Tida Tochirakarn, wife of the jailed Weng, as she waits for her turn to enter a room of grey grills. 'It is a shame for the government to blame them as ‘terrorists’.'

© Inter Press Service (2010) — All Rights Reserved. Original source: Inter Press Service

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