The network said the government should promote a free and fair referendum by supporting open campaigns and discussion.

A group of academics, including Anusorn Unno of the Thai Academic Network for Civil Rights, yesterday read the statement signed by 292 academics from across the nation outside the Bangkok Remand Prison, where the students are being detained.

The students from the New Democracy Movement (NDM) had joined six other activists, including three labour-union members, to distribute anti-draft charter leaflets in Samut Prakan on Thursday evening.

All 13 were arrested and charged with violating the junta’s Order No 3/2558, which bans political gatherings of more than five people. Their alleged anti-charter activities in Bangkok and nearby areas were said to mark the 84th anniversary of the Siam Revolution.

Six of the 13 were released on a Bt50,000 bail, while the seven NDM activists – students and graduates from Thammasat, Ramkhamhaeng and Kasetsart universities – did not ask for bail because they did not believe they had broken the law. Their lawyers are working on filing a new request in court for their unconditional release.

Anusorn criticised the current atmosphere, which he described as suppressing political freedoms, as well as the Referendum Law’s Article 61, which restricts people’s right to expression.

He said the group would invite academics living overseas to write e-mails to the government and the National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO) asking them to respond to their demands. The recent UK referendum “Brexit” should serve as an example because free expression was allowed, network members said.

Meanwhile, NCPO spokesman Winthai Suwaree told the press yesterday that the NCPO would not change its approach regarding politically motivated activities. He said participants would first be asked for their cooperation, but if their actions violate the law, then normal judicial procedures will follow.

Authorities would try to take every element into consideration when judging a situation, he said. He added that a recent event, where regime critics attached anti-referendum banners to balloons that were then released, constituted only a partial expression of opinion, but officials believed the action broke the law and had to take action.

 

Seven yellow shirts had filed a lawsuit against Kwanchai for an attack at Nongprajak Park in Udon Thani in 2008 that had left many people seriously injured.

Both the Criminal and Appeals Courts found Kwanchai guilty and sentenced him to two years and eight months in jail as well as a fine of Bt350,000 plus 7.5 per cent interest.

Kwanchai was released on a Bt500,000 bail after he appealed the verdict at Supreme Court, but then failed to turn up to hear the verdict on May 24. In addition, his Bt500,000 bail guarantee was confiscated yesterday when he once again failed to show in court. However, his wife Aporn Sarakham and their son Korawee Sarakham were present.

Aporn said she did not know her husband’s whereabouts, but knew he was in a safe place. He had called in to a radio station on June 13.

She said her husband may return to face the court once the country returns to “full democracy” because he had said he did not feel safe.

In a statement released from its Geneva office, Forum-Asia said Thailand’s candidacy for the term 2017-2018 is questionable given the deteriorating human rights situation under the military government in the country. In the statement, it said peace and security; development; and human rights are the three essential pillars of the United Nations (UN) and UNSC’s decisions on international peace and security will affect human rights. Yet in Thailand, after the coup in 2014, fundamental freedoms of the Thai people have been severely restricted under the military rule, it said.

“The international community should not entertain the Thai military government’s lip service to human rights. If Thailand aspires to be a non-permanent member of the UNSC, Thailand must fulfil its international human rights obligations, particularly those under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), to which Thailand is a state-party. It must improve the human rights situation at home and restore democracy,” says Evelyn Balais-Serrano, executive director of Forum-Asia.

The group calls on the UN General Assembly to carefully consider Thailand’s bid for a non-permanent seat on the UNSC. If Thailand is successful with its candidature, the UNGA will be once again endorsing a non-democratic Government with a troubling human rights record, it said.

Meanwhile, in a statement released by its New York office, HRW urged UN member countries to scrutinise the human rights records of both candidates from the Asia group – Thailand and Kazakhstan.

“The Security Council’s actions have global and lasting consequences, so UN member countries need to take their votes seriously,” said Philippe Bolopion, deputy director for global advocacy. “With Thailand and Kazakhstan, that means questioning both their human rights records and promises.”

On Thailand, HRW highlighted the suppression of expression following the military coup in May 2014. It said that the National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO) has regularly suppressed the views of persons who are openly critical of its policies and practices, arbitrarily arresting and prosecuting them, often in military courts. The junta has censored the media, increased surveillance of the Internet and online communications, and aggressively restricted free expression – including by abusing the draconian law against lese majeste (insulting the monarchy).

In Kazakhstan, the government in recent years has strengthened restrictions on freedom of association, speech, assembly, and religion. In response to planned peaceful protests in many cities in May 2016 over land rights issues, the police detained hundreds of people, including journalists and human rights monitors. Some activists linked to the protests face up to 15 years in prison on politically motivated charges.

“Debate happens in UN corridors in New York in a way that is not allowed in Kazakhstan itself,” Bolopion said. “The government has cracked down on various forms of peaceful dissent in recent years, setting a particularly poor record that any prospective Security Council member should be eager to cleanup.”

Human-rights lawyer Anont Nampa said the decision on the request would be known when the activists’ first 12-day prison remand round finishes next Tuesday.

The seven students from the New Democracy Movement (NDM) had joined six other activists, including three labour-union members, to distribute anti-charter leaflets in Samut Prakan on Thursday evening.

The 13 were arrested and charged with violating the junta’s Order 3/2558, which bans political gathering of more than four people. Their alleged anti-charter activities in Bangkok and nearby areas were said to mark the 84th anniversary of the Siam Revolution.

Six of the 13 were released on Bt50,000 bail, while the seven NDM activists – students and graduates from Thammasat, Ramkamhaeng and Kasetsart universities – did not request bail as they believed that they did not break the law.

In addition to violating the National Council for Peace and Order’s edict, eight of the 13 were charged with breaching National Security Announcement 25/2549, after they allegedly disobeyed police by refusing to be fingerprinted. That offence is punishable by up to six months in jail and/or a Bt1,000 fine.

NDM’s Facebook page said the detained activists were separated and tasked with doing “somewhat heavy” chores at Bangkok Remand Prison.

Human-rights advocates led by Anont and NDM members yesterday visited the students at the prison in a show of support.

Meanwhile, another group of seven students – six from the Seri (Liberty) Kasetsart group and one from NDM – have been charged with violating NCPO Order 3/2558 and the Public Assembly Act. The students gathered on Friday at Wat Prasri Mahadhat in Bang Khen in a bid to disseminate NDM documents regarding the charter draft.

However, the Military Court released the seven given that they are students and the offence not serious.

OPPOSITION leaders submitted a formal request to the British Prime Minister yesterday via the British Embassy in Bangkok to hand over details of the multi-million-dollar sale of fake bomb detectors to Thailand, which led to the detention of scores of innocent people.

British fraudster Gary Bolton was jailed in 2013 for making millions selling the GT200 – which he billed as a “magic wand” able to detect tiny particles of explosives or drugs from hundreds of metres away.

It was in fact a useless home-made plastic box with a radio antenna – made for $6 (Bt212) but sold for $3,300 up to $13,000 (Bt116,575 to Bt459,200) per unit to governments including Thailand, Mexico and Iraq.

Yesterday Jatuporn Prompan, leader of the United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship or “red-shirt” street movement, urged the British Embassy in Bangkok to share details of contracts between Bolton’s firm and Thai officials, including information about production, distribution, sales and prices, including taxes in the UK. “Particularly the contracts of broker companies which sold them (GT200) to the Thai government and how much they cost,” he said via YouTube .

A corruption probe into why the Thai military and several other departments bought the device despite expert advice has ground to a halt.

The Thai army chief at the time was Anupong Paochinda, the current Interior minister and an architect of the 2014 coup that restored the military to power, toppling the reds’ hero Yingluck Shinawatra.

Anupong repeatedly defended the use of the fake detector even as tests cast serious doubt over its efficacy.

In 2010, the year the GT200 was officially banned from export by British authorities, he told reporters that “we don’t have a replacement yet so we continue to use it”.

Last week Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha, a senior general during Anupong’s tenure as army chief, said the device was “useful once… but when they were proven to be useless they were not used anymore”.

Rights groups say hundreds of people were detained – some for several weeks – in the restive south after erroneous findings of traces of explosives by security officers using the GT200.

“Regardless of court rulings in the UK and overwhelming scientific evidence, Thai military leadership still defend the use of GT200,” Sunai Phasuk of Human Rights Watch Asia said.

He said the first sales took place in 2005, ultimately amounting to orders of nearly 1,400 GT200s worth $32 million across 15 separate agencies.

Sunai called for a probe into possible loss of life and the “large numbers of wrongful arrests” due to the use of the bogus equipment.

The military refuses to concede it was duped over its rumoured $20 million acquisition, or apologise to those held in what rights groups call a flagrant miscarriage of justice.

Department of Special Investigation head Pol Col Paisit Wongmuang said the DSI had already submitted its inquiry files to the National Anti-Corruption Commission, after it found grounds for corruption committed by state officials that bought the overpriced devices.

Criminal Code charges

It also filed a suit with the Attorney General against the sales agent in Thailand who duped the state agencies into buying the bogus devices. Another suit was filed against the importer of the devices.

The department also requested that public prosecutors in charge of foreign litigation seek documents from related agencies in the UK. That was done at the end of 2014, but they had not received any documents, Paisit said.

He spoke before a meeting of concerned agencies, called by Deputy Prime Minister Wissanu Krea-ngam, to seek compensation after several Thai agencies bought the fake devices.

A source said the DSI filed suits with the anti-graft agency in April 2011 against officials of some state agencies, accusing them of malfeasance and violating Article 157 of the Criminal Code.

The DSI also submitted investigation files for 16 special cases against the producers and sales agent in Thailand to the Office of the Attorney General’s Special Cases Division in connection with the GT200 and Alpha 6 scandal.

The country suffered losses put at Bt1.134 billion as a result of 11 agencies buying some 1,398 units of these two devices.

 

The new charter – if it passes the upcoming referendum – would create a “controlled democracy” in which politicians are strictly controlled by a new political system erected by the current regime, Sudarat Keyuraphan, a prominent Pheu Thai Party member, said yesterday.

At a public talk titled “How the Constitution Draft will Direct the Government” at Mahidol University, Sudarat said the charter draft had been designed to take control of regimes that demonstrate “poor governance”, so the powers-that-be were trying to find “decent” people to govern under the new charter.

“They have no confidence in the judgement of the people,” Sudarat said, adding that the country’s current leaders do not believe the public will elect the right leaders. “So they try to find a way to redirect everything. And there is the Senate, which will be the biggest party, although not elected by the people, as well as the independent agencies and the courts.”

All of these institutions would pose problems in the long run, she said.

Sudarat said a system of checks and balances would be absent. Political parties would not be able to compete based on policies because a “super board” would restrict them, and they would not be able to deal with economic issues.

The proposed constitution, she said, would not fix administrations that have poor governance. Instead, the draft was only an attempt to rearrange the power structure and give central authority to the bureaucracy, Army and independent organisations.

Sudarat stressed that if the perceived problem was politicians, they must improve themselves. But she said no one understands the public as well as politicians.

Somsak Prissananantakul, a veteran politician with Chart Thai Pattana Party, expressed a similar opinion about the constitution draft, saying it had been written based on mistrust of politicians.

He cited the contemporary political discourse of “bad politicians and rampant corruption” used as justification for two coups in the past decade. Constitutions written after each coup attempted to tackle the perceived problem based on coup-makers’ negative opinions about politicians, he said.

However, Somsak said, the regimes had not foreseen how such constitutions could cause more problems, especially when they have no connection with the public and are apparently devoid of of democratic spirit. People would increasingly distrust the constitution if they do not feel like they are included in the political system, he said.

Nipit Intrasombat, Democrat Party deputy leader, also slammed the charter draft, saying it had been spurred by a fear of “the voice of the majority”, especially when that voice favoured Pheu Thai. The coup-makers have since sought to exert control over the majority, Nipit said, pointing to the example of the Senate handpicked by the junta.

Aside from junta-selected Senate’s influence, the panel yesterday also discussed the 20-year strategy proposal, with many saying the plan would become another mechanism to overrule future elected governments. Nipit said the charter’s content constituted a great scheme planned by the current regime, which eventually would influence future governments’ policies.

He said amending the charter would not be easy and would probably take two to three years because a civilian government would not have the sweeping powers granted by Article 44 of the Interim Charter. As such, it would probably be easier simply to tear up the constitution and start over, he said, adding that it was quite probable that someone would do just that.