Thailand: Live Fire Zone

Unconfirmed reports indicate that Abhisit’s soldiers have shot dead at least 50 people so far.  Hundreds are injured.  They say there are 500 “terrorists” in the protest site.  Earlier they said that they would use snipers to shoot “terrorists.”

The only terrorists are in the government, the army, and the palace.

The tyrants say that the Red Shirts are all determined to overthrow the monarchy and therefore it is justifiable to kill them.  So having a monarchy is an excuse to kill anyone who fights for democracy and social justice.

Various government spokespeople, including Abhisit’s academic-for-hire Panitan Wattanayagorn and Censorship Boss Satit Wongnongtuay, continue to lie and lie again, claiming that troops only fire in self defense.  Yet all press reports show indiscriminate shooting of unarmed civilians including a 10-year-old boy, a paramedic, and foreign news reporters.

Fake human rights groups call on “both sides” to stop the violence.  Yet it is only one side which is using lethal violence against unarmed pro-democracy demonstrators.  Reporters Without Boarders demands that “both sides” guarantee the safety of reporters.  How can Red Shirts guarantee anyone’s safety when they are being murdered in cold blood?

Many so-called news reports write that troops fire on rioters.  No one is rioting except the army.  Others talk about “protests turning violent.”  It is not the protesters who are violent.

Unarmed pro-democracy protesters are being systematically murdered in order to keep Abhisit and his military backed government in power.  The King is silent as usual.  His only job, apart from counting his wealth, is to legitimize every bloody act that the army commits.  Yet so-called analysts write that he has “held the country together.”  The fact is he has supported every crackdown on democracy.  He is weak and spineless.  That is why millions of Red Shirts are becoming republicans.

The UN has just selected Thailand to be on the Human Rights Council.  What a joke!  But what can one expect from a body controlled by warmongers?

Red Shirts throughout the country are standing firm in the bloody fight for Democracy, Social Justice and Human Dignity.  I salute them!

* * *

Update at 03:25, Sunday, Bangkok Time:

At 19.30 Saturday, the Erawan Medical Center said 22 deaths.  172 injured (including 1 Canadian, 1 Polish, 1 Burmese, 1 Liberian).  But an official from the center says that the real death toll is higher but cannot be reported at the moment.  A Po-tek-tung emergency service official says that there are at least 14 corpses in Rajprarop area which cannot be retrieved because they get shot at by the army and one of their crew has been killed.  That would take the death toll to 36.


Giles Ji Ungpakorn is a Thai socialist, currently in exile in the U.K.  See, also, “Thailand: Seeing through the Mist of Tear Gas” (MRZine, 16 April 2010).




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