Part 1 CRIMINAL JUSTICE CASES

Thailand murders: Amnesty International call for police torture probe

24 December 2015

Amnesty International has called for an independent investigation into allegations that two Burmese men, convicted of murdering two UK tourists, were tortured by Thai police.

Champa Patel from Amnesty said the police in Thailand had a "long and disturbing" history of using torture.

Convicted murderers Zaw Lin and Wai Phyo now face the death penalty.

A Thai court ruled on Thursday that they killed Hannah Witheridge, 23, and David Miller, 24.

The British backpackers' bodies were found on a Koh Tao island beach in September 2014.

Miss Witheridge, from Hemsby, Norfolk, had been raped before she was killed, while Mr Miller, of Leeds, had been hit over the head before drowning in the sea.

Lawyers for the defendants - both aged 22 and migrants from Myanmar - have said they will appeal.

The accused, both bar workers, retracted their initial confessions, claiming police had tortured them, an allegation supported by human rights campaigners.

But standing outside court shortly after the verdict Mr Miller's brother Michael said justice had "been delivered", and described the evidence against Lin and Phyo as "absolutely overwhelming".

He also called for campaigners to respect the court's decision.

But Mr Patel, who is Amnesty International's director for south-east Asia, said the torture claims required an independent investigation, which the police themselves should not be in charge of.

"The Thai police force has a long and disturbing track record of using torture and other forms of ill-treatment to extract 'confessions'," he added.

"This is far from an isolated case.

"The Thai authorities must start taking concrete steps to stamp out torture, not just paying lip service to doing so," he added.

The human rights campaign group also said that in its own investigation of the case, the Thai National Human Rights Commission found the allegations of torture to be credible.

Earlier, Miss Witheridge's family said they needed time "to digest the outcome of the trial verdict".

During the trial prosecutors said DNA evidence collected from cigarette butts, a condom and the bodies of the victims, linked Lin and Phyo to the deaths.

But lawyers defending the accused argued DNA from a garden hoe - allegedly used as the murder weapon - did not match samples taken from the men.

They also claimed evidence had been mishandled by police and the pair's confessions were the result of "systematic abuse" of migrants in the area.

Thailand has not carried out any executions since 2009, when two executions took place, according to a death penalty database collated by Cornell Law School in the US.

The victims met on Koh Tao while staying in the same hotel.

The family of Mr Miller attended the hearing but relatives of Miss Witheridge did not travel to Thailand for the verdicts.

1

Wednesday, 18 January 2006, 14:39 GMT

Amnesty concern at Thai sentence

Human rights groups have voiced concern at the short time it has taken for two Thai fishermen to be sentenced to death for killing student Katherine Horton.

Amnesty International and Fair Trials Abroad have questioned the fairness of the trial, completed in three weeks.

Wichai Somkhaoyai, 24, and Bualoi Posit, 23, now face execution for the murder of Katherine Horton, who was 21.

But Conservative MP Stephen Crabb said he respected Thailand's right to deal with the men by its own processes.

The fishermen were sentenced to death on Wednesday, two-and-a-half weeks after Miss Horton's body was found in the sea off the island of Koh Samui on 2 January.

Lawyers for the men immediately said they would appeal.

Miss Horton's family, who on Tuesday led hundreds of mourners at her funeral, issued a statement thanking the Thai authorities for their speed in finding the men responsible.

The statement made clear that, contrary to reports, the family had not expressed an opinion about what should happen to the men.

But Amnesty International campaigner Katherine Gerson told BBC Radio Wales the organisation "regrets" the imposition of the death penalty.

"We understand that the judge has stated he imposed the death sentence because of the inhumanity of the crime," she said.

"We would say that it is an inhumane treatment and would urge the authorities not to execute the individuals who have been sentenced."

She said the case raised "many questions" about death penalty trials in Thailand, and queried why a case with that "level of priority" was conducted at such speed.

"If Thailand executes these two men, it will be a step backward for a country which has been moving away from the death penalty," she said.

Disagreeing with comments by the Thai prime minister ahead of the trial which called for the death sentence, she added: " That is for the judiciary to decide."

Fair Trials Abroad said they were "disappointed" by the sentence.

Spokesman Stephen Jacobi said he was not aware of a death sentence being imposed in similar murder cases in Thailand and highlighted the jail term given to a police sergeant who killed a British couple last year.

But the Conservative MP for Preseli Pembrokeshire, Stephen Crabb, said while he did not support the death penalty in the UK, every country had its own judicial processes.

"This has been dealt with by the Thai authorities and I respect their right to proceed according to the established judicial processes in their country," he said.

"I don't suspect many people in the UK will have any sympathy with these men. They have pleaded guilty to a brutal and disgusting crime."

Conservative Monmouth MP and Welsh assembly member David Davies said: "Rather than thinking about these two rapists and murderers my thoughts shall be with the parents and family and friends of the poor girl who was murdered."

2

Bangkok bomb: Has the case been solved?

By Jonathan Head

South East Asia correspondent

5 October 2015

Twenty people died and more than 120 were injured in the horrific bombing on 17 August in central Bangkok at the Erawan shrine. But the investigation into who perpetrated the attack has seen conflicting statements and perplexing developments. Here are the twist and turns that took police from knowing very little after the deadly blast, to claiming to have identified their main suspect six weeks later.

On 18 August, a day after the bomb, another explosion in a canal sent a huge column of water over passers-by, but caused no injuries. Later police identified it as caused by a bomb similar to the one at the shrine.

On 19 August police showed CCTV video, taken from the shrine and surrounding area. In it a man in a yellow shirt, with long hair and thick-framed spectacles, leaves a black backpack beside a bench at the shrine, and walks out just before the bomb explodes.

The police can ascertain nothing about his identity from the grainy images, and have no information after he was dropped off by a motorbike taxi about a kilometre from the shrine.

On 22 August new CCTV video shows another man kicking a bag into the canal where the 18 August explosion occurred. This took place just 30 minutes after the first bomb.

The police now know they are dealing with a network. But their often conflicting statements undermine public confidence in their competence.

On 24 August the investigation stalls. Police complain that inconsistent witness testimony and broken CCTV cameras are hampering their work.

"We have to use our imagination," admits police chief Somyot Poompunmuang. He says they do not know whether the perpetrators are still in Thailand or not.

On 29 August there is a breakthrough - police and military officers detain their first suspect, a foreign man carrying a fake Turkish passport, found surrounded by potential bomb-making materials in an apartment north of Bangkok.

The following day they find more materials in another apartment. A Thai Muslim woman and her Turkish husband are also named as suspects. Both are believed to be in Turkey.

On 31 August Chief Somyot brings out a stack of cash - 3m Thai baht ($82,000; £54,000) offered as a reward for information leading to arrests - and gives it to his own officers.

On 1 September the second suspect is detained, after being handed back across the border by the Cambodian authorities.

He is carrying a Chinese passport that identifies him as Yusufu Mierali, a Muslim from Xinjiang where the Uighur minority lives. Police believe he may have assembled the bomb. They think the yellow-shirt bomber is still at large.

By 5 September a total of 10 arrest warrants have been issued.

On 9 September police identify a man named "Izan" they believe organised the bombing, who left Thailand for Bangladesh the night before the attack. With the help of Bangladesh they trace his movements via Delhi and Abu Dhabi to Istanbul.

3

His passport shows his real name as Abudusataer Abudureheman, a Muslim Chinese citizen from Xinjiang. There is still confusion over whether Thailand has requested any help from Turkey. The Thai police have insisted all along that foreign assistance is not needed.

By now it is clear most of the plotters are foreigners. Both suspects in Thai custody are Muslim Uighurs from China's Xinjiang province, as is "Izan", the man the Thais believe was the ringleader.

Sources who have met the suspects say they speak of repression in Xinjiang and appear to have been radicalised. But the police continue to maintain the bombing was not an act of politically-motivated terrorism, but the work of people smugglers annoyed by Thai anti-trafficking operations.

This despite the growing conviction among terrorism experts that it was most likely retribution for the Thai decision to forcibly repatriate 109 Uighur asylum-seekers to China in July.

Police on 25 September say they now believe that the first suspect they detained, Bilal Mohammed, is the yellow-shirt bomber. They say he confessed to being the bomber on 23 September and that this is supported by new CCTV video and photographs from Yusufu Mierali's camera.

Bilal had until then insisted he was just being smuggled to Malaysia using a false Turkish passport. His unexpected confession was made in military custody, without his lawyer. A source who has seen him tells the BBC he believes Bilal was coerced into confessing.

A total of 17 arrest warrants have been issued for suspects carrying Chinese, Turkish, Thai and Pakistani passports. Fifteen are still at large, probably outside Thailand. It is not clear what the Thai authorities are doing to track these suspects down.

Outgoing police chief Somyot announces on 28 September that the case is solved, they have the main perpetrators in custody. He displays the 3m baht reward again.

He also suggests for the first time that there are links with a "political group", and names a man loosely affiliated with the red-shirt movement loyal to ousted Prime Ministers Yingluck and Thaksin Shinawatra, who is wanted in connection with two smaller explosions in 2010 and 2014.

It turns out this man has been living outside Thailand for more than a year, and Gen Somyot backtracks. But other senior officials say they are still looking for him.

On 30 September chief Somyot retires after a year in the job. He still insists the motive for the Bangkok bombing is anger among people-smugglers, not retaliation by militants for deporting Uighurs.

Outside the police very few people are persuaded by Gen Somyot's theory. The two suspects in custody have yet to be charged. When they are, they face trial in a military court, which human rights groups have warned would not be equipped to judge a complex case like this.

1 June, 2005, 06:10 GMT 07:10 UK

Thailand terror case collapses

Four Thai Muslims have been acquitted of belonging to extremist group Jemaah Islamiah (JI) and plotting bomb attacks against Western embassies in Thailand.

The high-profile case was dismissed after a Bangkok court found a lack of evidence against the men.

Their prosecution had stirred anger in southern Thailand, where a recent surge of violence has been blamed by the government on Muslim separatists.

Their lawyer, Somchai Neelaphaijit, vanished mysteriously in March 2004.

4

The case against them stemmed from the arrest in May 2003 of Singaporean Arifin bin Ali, allegedly a senior member of JI, which has been blamed for a string of bomb attacks in South East Asia, including the 2002 attack on Bali.

During the trial, Thai police told the court that Arifin implicated three of the four defendants as conspirators in plans to bomb the US, British, Israeli, Singaporean and Australian embassies in Thailand, as well as tourist sites.

But the judges' verdict pointed to the prosecution's lack of physical evidence to back up its case.

"No evidence was found that they were setting up a JI network or gathering people to launch a terror attack," the verdict said.

The accused - doctor Waemahadi Wae-dao, school owner Maisuru Haji Abdulloh and his son Muyahid, and a manual labourer, Samarn Wae-kaji - all denied the charges, which could have seen them sentenced to 10 years if convicted.

The case against the men added to tensions in Thailand's troubled south, where more than 800 people have been killed in the last 18 months, in violence blamed on the heavy-handed authorities, and Muslim extremists.

Their lawyer, Somchai Neelaphaijit, a prominent Muslim lawyer and human rights activist, reportedly told colleagues he had received death threats after he agreed to take up their case.

The four men are to remain in detention while the prosecution decides whether to appeal.

2 HUMAN TRAFFICKING

13 April, 2004, 16:46 GMT 17:46 UK

Thailand's cycle of trafficking

By Caroline Irby

In a bakery in Northern Thailand, young girls are being taught to make cakes.

The bakery is just one of many initiatives designed to help young people deemed vulnerable to being trafficked into prostitution.

The US State Department has called human trafficking "the emerging human rights issue of the 21st century", and many organisations have sprung up in response to the problem.

But despite their best efforts, 60% of the Thai women "rescued" by these organisations end up back in brothels.

To disrupt the trade seems practically impossible, and the scant returns from counter-trafficking initiatives can be frustratingly slim.

Trafcord, an organisation formed with US support in 2002, is attempting to tackle human trafficking in northern Thailand, near the Burmese border.

But local advocacy groups complain that the brothel raids organised by Trafcord net more Burmese women voluntarily engaged in prostitution than victims of coerced sexual labour.

Ben Svasti, programme coordinator for Trafcord, admits it can be difficult to differentiate between women who have been victims of trafficking and those who are there of their own volition.

"It's a very imperfect operation," he said. "I haven't come across a happily-ever-after case.

"As time passes, poverty pushes the child or young woman to go out and work again. Success depends on where you end your story."

5

Five hundred miles south, at Thailand's border with Cambodia, the IOM (International Organisation for Migration) is endeavouring to send home a dozen Cambodian children trafficked into Bangkok.

The children know each other well - they lived on the streets of Bangkok together, selling noodles, flowers and sweets for a local man's profit.

All have made the journey at least twice before, having been resold to traffickers once they reached home. This time they will be taken into care.

Acknowledging the difficulties of breaking the trafficking cycle, the IOM recently launched a campaign to address trafficking from a pre-emptive angle.

An animated film, Shattered Dreams, tells the story of a young girl who leaves her village for the city, where her life becomes a nightmare when she is forced into prostitution.

The film has been translated into several languages and will be shown in Thailand, Cambodia, Burma, Laos, Vietnam and China.

Children trafficked to work in factories in Bangkok have already watched the film, and 90% said they would not have come to Bangkok had they been aware of the situation depicted in the video.

But while measures to raise awareness have proved effective in the past, the incidence of trafficking itself has not diminished - its source has just shifted.

Demand for cheap labour and prostitution remains, and if one potential source of recruits dries up, agents simply look elsewhere.

Mr Svasti estimates that 90% of trafficked sex workers in northern Thailand today are from Burma. He says this pattern will not change until the situation in Burma improves.

Pierre Legros, director of the Cambodian counter-trafficking organisation Afesip, says the cycle of trafficking can only be broken by new laws.

To this end, he has challenged a young British lawyer, Aarti Kapoor, to write a model law addressing trafficking.

United Nations protocol and US legislation currently provide the framework that organisations campaigning against trafficking refer to, but Ms Kapoor says these are only a reflection of basic minimum standards.

"Our starting point," she says, are "the maximum standards".

Forced to fish: Slavery on Thailand's trawlers

By Becky Palmstrom

BBC News, Thailand

23 January 2014

Thailand is the third largest exporter of seafood in the world, supplying supermarkets in Europe and America, but it's accused of crewing fishing boats with Burmese and Cambodian men who've been sold and forced to work as slaves.

Military music is pumping out into the tropical sunshine. In front of us are some 100 police officers standing in rows, and two heavily armed SWAT teams standing at attention. General Chatchawal Suksomjit, deputy chief of police, is walking down the lines, shaking hands, nodding and saluting.

With his dark glasses, slicked-back hair and shiny grey uniform he oozes importance.

6

He ushers us on to some waiting police boats and out into the waters of the Malacca Straits, along the border with Malaysia.

The general is head of a new committee set up to deal with the trafficking of men into the fishing business - an industry he describes as "dirty, dangerous and difficult".

Human rights groups claim the Thai fishing fleet is much worse than this. Phil Robertson of Human Rights Watch, who wrote a report on it for the International Organization for Migration says the use of forced labour is "systematic" and "pervasive".

"The biggest problem we've seen is that if people can't work, people aren't useful on board, they can be killed and thrown overboard," he says. "It doesn't happen on every boat but it does happen enough to raise serious questions about the lawlessness in this industry."

There is also a recruitment crisis. By the Ministry of Labour's count, fishing boats in Thailand are short of 50,000 men. One captain at the port of Chonburi says they are desperate.

"Because Thai fishing is difficult, some people we have to force on to the boat," he says.

Many boat owners and captains rely on brokers to recruit their workers, but the brokers are often unscrupulous, tricking young men from neighbouring countries into a job from which there is no escape.

Whether it's freedom from surveillance or freedom to be single, this Spring the BBC is investigating what freedom means in the modern world.

As the police boats charge out towards the border with Malaysia, we approach four battered fishing boats. The SWAT teams surge on to the deck of the first boat, but meet no resistance.

"The focus of the mission today is to find trafficked and forced labour," announces the general in Thai, before ordering the mainly Burmese crew down on to the deck. The crew have holes in their shirts or no shirts at all. Most are barefoot. We slide around on the nets, scales and fish guts on the deck.

When I talk in Burmese they speak quietly, glancing nervously at the captain and the crew master.

One group say they didn't know they were coming on to a boat when they left Rakhine State in the west of Burma, or Myanmar as it is also known. They owe a broker $750 (£450) for bringing them here. One man glances out from under a mop of salt-soaked hair. "It's been seven months," he says. He still hasn't been paid.

With my basic Burmese and the crew's reluctance to talk, it's hard to assess the situation but brokers, deception and debt often go hand-in-hand with forced labour.

Typically an illegal worker from Cambodia or Burma meets a broker and is offered a factory job. He accepts and finds himself passed from one broker to another, taken to a port and put on a fishing boat. The victim is then told he owes a lot of money.

It's a well-sprung trap. If he escapes, then as an undocumented migrant the police will arrest and deport him. One Cambodian man I spoke to was trapped for three years on a boat without any wages, while he "paid off his debt". He was never told how much he owed.

The general and his team cannot talk directly to the Burmese-speaking crew because they haven't brought a translator so determining whether the men are trafficked is not possible. After 20 minutes the general ushers us off the boat.

"Wouldn't it make your job easier to have a translator?" I ask. He replies that usually they rely on someone on board who can speak Burmese, such as the crew master. However, it's often the crew master who is accused of the worst cases of abuse and violence.

"How do you know there was no forced labour or trafficking here?" I ask.

7

"From what we saw, there was no lock-up or detention room," he says. "We saw no signs of harm on their bodies or in their facial expressions. By looking into their faces and their eyes they didn't look like they had been forced to work."

It didn't seem like a foolproof system.

When the authorities do rescue trafficked men they often end up in a government-run detention centre on the outskirts of Bangkok.

Ken is one of these men. He explains that he was promised a good job in a factory but was forced on to a tiny boat in the open sea where he fished 20 hours a day, seven days a week. When he talks, his rough fingers run over the word L.O.V.E, which is clumsily tattooed across his knuckles. The broker said Ken owed a lot of money for being found a job and taken to the port. Months passed but Ken, like so many others, was never paid.

"People said, anyone who tried to escape had their legs broken, their hands broken or were even killed," he says.

Desperate to escape, Ken jumped ship and swam for six hours in the open sea, until he was picked up by a yacht and dropped off in the resort of Pattaya. Like many trafficked men, he felt ashamed to return home empty-handed so when the police found him and deported him, he crossed the border illegally again to find work in Thailand.

This time he was told there was a job for him in a pineapple canning factory, and he agreed. But there was no factory, just another boat and another insurmountable debt. Fortunately for him, other crew-members managed to smuggle a phone on board to call for help and he was rescued as part of a special operation by Thailand's Department of Special Investigations.

Puntrik Smiti, the Deputy Director General at the Ministry of Labour, admits that men like Ken are vulnerable. "There are some good fishing operators who are trying to improve the treatment of workers," she says. "The problem is there are small operators who are unregistered and don't want to come into the system."

Only one in six boats is registered, she says, and most of the workers are illegal. She also points out that existing labour laws are inadequate. In fact Thailand's Labour Protection Act exempts workers employed in the fishing industry, while other ministerial regulations exclude boats with a crew of less than 20, or those that travel outside Thai waters for more than a year.

Phil Robertson of Human Rights Watch says it is on these long-haul boats that the worst abuses take place.

"If you're talking about a fish caught on a Thai boat that has gone overseas, that has gone to Malaysian waters, Indonesian waters or further afield, you're definitely talking about a fish tainted with forced labour," he says.

"If you're talking about a fish caught in Thai waters, the chances might be less. But there are much fewer fish caught that way. And now the major exporting is coming from the overseas catch."

The effect of local over-fishing is forcing Thai boats to go as far afield as Yemen to maintain an export business worth $7bn annually. Mother ships refuel boats far from shore and transfer crews, ice and fish at sea.

Trapped at sea, workers cannot escape or complain about their conditions. The system also muddies the supply chain because fish are mixed at sea, and often again at the ports and processing plants, before being sold to larger companies for export. Max Tunon of the International Labour Organisation, who published a report on the industry in September, says it is "close to impossible" to disentangle Thailand's fish supply chains.

Consumer pressure may one day force the industry to make these supply chains more transparent. Mackerel, sardines and other Thai fish are bought by some Western supermarkets and restaurants, while household brands such as John West and Chicken of the Sea are both subsidiaries of the largest exporter of Thai seafood, the Thai Union Group.

For its part, the Thai Union Group says it only sources fish from boats that are properly registered, with crews that have proper working documents. A representative says the company works with its partners to "take meaningful

8

steps to promote human rights" in all its business operations. Mackerel and sardines accounted for only 6% of its revenue in 2012. Tuna is caught by a different fleet of boats.

A few days later in Burma, we sit on the floor of a bamboo shack in Bago, 100km (60 miles) north of Rangoon. This is Ken's home. Although idyllic, the poverty is palpable.

Ken's parents haven't heard anything from their son, who is now 32, for four years.

His father is thin, with a gaunt face and red teeth from chewing betel nut. His mother is plumper and has a comb holding up her grey hair.

I show them a video of Ken. "That's him! That's my son," his mother cries in recognition.

She raises her hands to her face and weeps, while her husband places his hand close to hers.

"We didn't know anything," she says. "We heard nothing."

"I am so happy, so happy," Ken's father says, unable to tear his red-rimmed eyes from the screen.

It's hard to know just how many more families like Ken's are waiting for sons and husbands trapped at sea. With some vessels spending months or even years away, without being checked, the system encourages abuse.

Ultimately, as one fishing boat captain told us, if the Burma or Cambodian economies boom and there are jobs for men back home, the Thai fishing fleet will be in trouble.

This could also force the industry to change its ways, quite aside from any consumer pressure. For now though, the flow of men trafficked into slavery on fishing boats continues.

3 IMMIGRATION

Monday, 19 January 2009

Thailand to tackle migrant claims

Thailand's new Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva has met human rights officials to discuss claims of Thai army abuse of asylum seekers.

His staff say they are investigating reports that troops sent Rohingya people from western Burma back to sea in boats without engines.

Reports of more than 500 deaths have poured in over the weekend, from Indian officials and regional newspapers.

These suggest that more than 1,000 Rohingya were put to sea in December.

"The prime minister told the [National Human Rights] Commission not to worry about the Rohingya case," deputy government spokesman Buddhipongse Punnakanta told reporters.

"He assigned all the government authorities involved to keep him up-to-date," he said.

Deputy Prime Minister Suthep Thaugsuban said he had been informed that the soldiers did not abuse the Rohingya.

"I myself believe the officers did not do such a thing because Thai people have generosity and kindness," he said.

Indian officials told reporters that they had rescued hundreds of Rohingya refugees, who are mostly Muslim and live along the border of Burma and Bangladesh.

"They said they were taken to an island off the Thai coast and beaten up before being forced into boats and pushed into the high seas," said Ranjit Narayan, a police official on India's remote Andaman and Nicobar islands.

9

Coast guard commander SP Sharma told AFP news agency that India had rescued 446 refugees from four boats since the end of December.

The figures are in line with those of the Sunday Morning Post, a Hong Kong newspaper, which said it had compiled a toll of 538 missing or dead.

According to Mr Sharma, the migrants said they had been arrested by Thai officials and set adrift without engines or navigational equipment.

"Some survivors also said their boat was towed out to sea by the Thai navy and given two sacks of boiled rice and two gallons of water before being abandoned in the middle of the sea," he said.

One traumatised survivor the BBC spoke to said captured migrants were towed out to sea and forced onto an unpowered boat at gunpoint. He said four men who resisted were thrown overboard with their hands and feet tied.

Privately, some Thai military and police sources have admitted to the BBC that migrants had been sent back to sea.

They say the rising numbers of Rohingyas reaching Thailand from Burma or Bangladesh are seen as a security risk, because of fears they may include Islamic militants.

But senior military figures have denied the accusations.

The South China Morning Post quoted Thai army chief Anupong Paojinda as denying that any Rohingya refugee had "been tortured".

But the paper said he did not specifically address the claims that refugees had been deliberately set adrift.

"Authorities followed the regular process when arresting the illegal migrants," Thai navy spokesman Captain Prachachart Sirisawat told AFP.

The United Nation's refugee agency UNHCR - whose Asia headquarters is based in the Thai capital - has expressed serious concern about the reports.

UNHCR's Kitty McKinsey said that if the allegations turned out to be true, Thailand would be "putting people's lives at risk by towing them out to sea", breaching human-rights conventions.

The Rohingya are stateless and face persecution from Burma's military regime.

6 May, 2000, 04:43 GMT 05:43 UK

Human rights fears for Burmese refugees

An international human rights group has called for increased protection for Burmese refugees in Thailand, following reports that some have been arrested and forcibly repatriated.

The organisation, Human Rights Watch, said the Thai government had legitimate security concerns, but that did not justify acts which endanger the refugees.

Human Rights Watch said in a statement that the Thai government had used incidents such as two cases of hostage taking involving Burmese activists, to justify a wider crackdown on Burmese living in Thailand. The group said that in one incident in February, five Burmese refugees had been deported and later jailed by the military authorities in Burma.

Cambodian migrants flee Thailand amid crackdown fears

14 June 2014

Tens of thousands of Cambodians are fleeing neighbouring Thailand amid fears the new military leadership will crackdown on migrant workers.

10

The International Organization for Migration (IOM) tweeted that 70,000 people crossed the border this week.

A spokesman for the agency said many migrants were fearful about what would happen to them if they stayed.

Several migrants have reportedly been fired from jobs and sent home since the army took power in a coup last month.

But the authorities have denied rumours swirling of people being beaten up or even shot dead.

Many Cambodians have been massing in border areas, reportedly transported in some cases in buses laid on by the Thai authorities.

The IOM said hundreds of trucks, buses and trains were being used to take the workers back to their home towns.

"The overwhelming priority is to secure enough large vehicles to prevent people being stuck here for a long time in less than ideal conditions," said the IOM's Brett Dickson in the border town of Poi Pet.

"Many of these people are severely economically disadvantaged and have spent all their savings, if they had any, to get this far."

There are believed to be at least 150,000 Cambodian migrants working in Thailand, though only 80,000 are there legally.

Thai Foreign Ministry spokesman Sek Wannamethee said the authorities "realise the importance of migrant workers... toward driving Thailand's economy forward".

"As a result, we would like to revamp and integrate the management system, as well as get rid of exploitation from smugglers, in a bid to prevent abuses of the workers and human trafficking problems".

But a Cambodian human rights body accused the Thai military of violating the workers rights, by "forcefully" expelling them and "placing them in crowded trucks".

Thailand urged to stop sending prisoners out to sea

15 January 2015

More than 40 labour and human rights groups have urged Thailand to end a project to recruit prisoners to work on fishing boats.

In a letter to Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha they said the project would not address the problems in the fishing industry and posed a serious threat to prisoners' rights.

Thailand is the world's third-largest seafood exporter.

Its fishing industry has been suffering from a labour shortage.

More than 300,000 people work in the industry. Many are illegal migrants from neighbouring countries who are often subject to ill-treatment.

The lack of manpower has fuelled human trafficking.

"Simply replacing vulnerable migrant workers with released prisoners will not solve the abusive working conditions and many other problems present in the Thai fishing industry," the letter says.

Last December the Thai labour ministry announced it would send consenting prisoners who had less than a year of their sentence left to go and work on fishing boats.

On Wednesday the ministry added it was not sending current inmates to sea but that a pilot scheme was intended to help ex-prisoners find work, while also addressing the labour shortage and fighting human trafficking.

11

As a result, more than 170 prisoners were now working on fishing boats in Samut Sakhon province west of Bangkok, it added.

The warning by rights groups comes as Thailand is trying to boost its record in fighting human trafficking ahead of a US deadline to show improvement.

In its annual report on human trafficking last June, the US state department downgraded Thailand to the lowest status for not fully complying with minimum standards for its elimination.

The Prime Minister, Gen Prayuth Chan-ocha, has acknowledged the complicity of some Thai authorities in smuggling people and forcing them to work in the fishing industry.

4 FREEDOM OF SPEECH

Thailand Phuketwan reporters face defamation charges

14 July 2015

Two journalists are on trial in the southern Thai island of Phuket for allegedly defaming the Thai navy.

Their charges stem from a July 2013 online article which included a paragraph, originally published by Reuters, on human trafficking.

Alan Morison and Chutima Sidasathian of website Phuketwan, who pleaded not guilty, face up to seven years in jail.

Reuters quoted an unnamed smuggler that Thai naval forces made money from turning a blind eye to trafficking.

Reuters has since won a Pulitzer Prize for its reporting on the Rohingya which included that particular article. The wire agency does not face any charges.

The trial opened with a navy captain testifying he filed the defamation case on behalf of the navy, a lawyer representing the journalists told AFP news agency.

"He also confirmed that the Phuketwan quotes were lifted from [the] Reuters article," the lawyer was quoted as saying.

The BBC's Jonah Fisher says that despite its small size, Phuketwan has a well-earned reputation for reporting on the smuggling and abuse of Rohingya, who come from Myanmar (also known as Burma).

In the last year it has become apparent that some Thai officials - although not specifically the navy - have been making money from people smuggling, says our correspondent.

The Thai government has since embarked on a crackdown with dozens arrested, including officials and policemen.

Rohingya Muslims who face persecution in Myanmar have been fleeing the country in recent years. Many of them head to Muslim-dominated Malaysia or Indonesia through Thailand, often using people smugglers, but many also end up being trafficked.

Mr Morison, a 67-year-old Australian is the editor of the website and Ms Chutima, a 34-year-old Thai citizen, is a reporter. They have been charged with defamation, which can be considered a criminal offence in Thailand.

They also face charges for breaching the Computer Crimes Act.

Rights group Reporters without Borders has condemned the trial calling the act "a draconian 2007 law that gives the authorities a great deal of leeway to gag online critics and arrest journalists and bloggers for political reasons".

Human Rights Watch's Phil Robertson said that the trial was "a clear indicator of how far and fast the environment for free expression has deteriorated [in Thailand] under military rule."

12

Several rights groups have sent an open letter to Thai PM Prayuth Chan-ocha calling for charges to be dropped.

"We're seriously concerned, but the principles are pretty clear... the freedom of the media is an essential part of democracy everywhere," Mr Morison told the BBC earlier on Tuesday.

The Bangkok Post reported that the navy had earlier offered to withdraw the libel case if the two apologised, but they declined as they believed they did no wrong.

"We have always said that, because the paragraph was written by Reuters' journalists, not us, that Reuters should be asked to apologise. When Reuters apologises, we will consider whether we should too," Mr Morison was quoted as saying.

Friday, 26 June 2009 10:12 UK

Concern at secret Thailand trial

By Jonathan Head

The human rights group Amnesty International has condemned the secret trial in Thailand of a woman charged with insulting the royal family.

The woman was arrested a year ago after giving a speech in Bangkok in which she attacked the monarchy.

The start of her trial was delayed this week when her lawyer appealed against the decision to hold a closed trial.

Critics say strict laws against insulting the monarchy are being used to stifle discussion of its future.

Thailand concedes that the lese-majeste laws are imperfect, but says they protect the monarchy.

People in Thailand who have listened to the speech say they have never heard anything like it.

Daranee Charncherngsilpakul took to the stage at a protest in central Bangkok in June last year and sharply criticised the monarchy.

She even made personal attacks on the country's revered King Bhumipol Adulyadej, warning him that the monarchy would be overthrown by a popular revolution.

Going by the nickname Dar Torpedo, she was already well known as an outspoken supporter of ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra.

But the blunt language she used to criticise the King in a public arena, just a short distance from the palace, has shocked even those Thais who do not consider themselves ardent royalists.

Given the severe penalties for insulting the monarchy in Thailand, no-one was surprised when Ms Daranee was arrested shortly afterwards.

Her trial, however, which started this week, has alarmed human rights groups.

The presiding judge ordered hearings to be held in secret, citing national security concerns.

Her lawyer is appealing, on the grounds that Thailand's constitution guarantees defendants the right to a public trial.

Sam Zarifi from Amnesty International has warned that "when a judge closes the doors on a trial it significantly raises the risk of injustice taking place.

"The Thai government will have a very difficult time explaining why the trial of someone charged with making an insulting remark could compromise Thailand's national security," he said.

Ms Daranee faces between nine and 45 years in prison if she is convicted.

13

Until recently the lese majeste law was rarely invoked in Thailand - but the number of cases has risen sharply during the political turmoil of the past three years.

A colleague of Daranee Charncherngsilpakul was jailed for six years last November.

Earlier this year a 34-year-old engineer was jailed for 10 years for posting a video deemed insulting to the monarchy on the website YouTube.

Neither trial was mentioned in the mainstream Thai media.

In January this year an Australian man, Harry Nicolaides, was also jailed for three years over a novel he wrote four years ago in which he referred briefly to the scandalous private life of a Thai crown prince. He was later pardoned.

Police say they are now preparing to arrest several more anti-government activists on the same charge.

The pro-Thaksin red shirt movement is known to have a number of republican sympathisers and former communists in its ranks.

Mr Thaksin himself has been accused by his critics of harbouring plans to abolish the monarchy, accusations he has strongly denied.

The government has acknowledged that the lese majeste law has flaws - but says it is necessary to protect the monarchy.

Critics of the law argue that it is being used to stifle discussion of the monarchy's future, at a time of heightened public anxiety over the succession, because of the King's age and frail health.

Thailand activist jailed for royal insult

28 February 2012

A Thai court has sentenced a political activist to seven and a half years in prison for insulting the monarchy.

Surachai Danwattananusorn, 71, was convicted of making defamatory speeches during rallies organised by the red-shirt political movement in 2010.

It is the latest in a series of cases brought under the lese majeste law.

It protects the most senior members of the royal family from insult, but rights groups say it is being used to suppress legitimate debate.

Mr Surachai was initially sentenced to 15 years, but the court cut this in half after he pleaded guilty to some of the charges.

The well-known activist, who was arrested a year ago, has been very vocal in condemning the 2006 coup that ousted former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, who the red-shirts broadly support.

Mr Surachai's lawyer says that the charges were politically motivated.

Thailand has some of the strictest lese majeste laws in the world, and any discussion of the monarchy is extremely sensitive, reports the BBC's Rachel Harvey in Bangkok.

But calls for reform have grown after a recent series of controversial cases, our correspondent says.

In recent years, the law has been used far more frequently and far more widely than in the past.

The United States, the European Union and human rights groups have expressed concern about the way in which the law is being applied.

14

Late last year, a 61-year-old grandfather was found guilty of sending text messages deemed to be offensive to the queen and was sentenced to 20 years.

A Thai-born American citizen is also serving two and a half years for posting online translations of a banned biography of the king.

Thailand's criminal code defines lese majeste as defaming, insulting or threatening the king, queen, heir-apparent or regent.

Thailand military court jails woman for 'anti-royal Facebook post'

16 December 2015

A military court in Thailand has sentenced a woman to nine-and-a-half years in prison for defaming the country's monarchy on Facebook.

The defendant, identified as Chayapha, was arrested in June and charged with sedition for a posting allegedly opposing the military government.

A strict lese majeste law makes it a crime to criticise Thailand's royals.

Prosecutions have soared since the army, which styles itself a champion of the monarchy, seized power last year.

Critics have said the broadly-worded lese majeste laws are being used to silence dissent and opponents.

The woman was found guilty on Tuesday at a hearing at which she did not have a lawyer present, a court official told AFP news agency.

"From her Facebook posts, she was found guilty of defaming the monarchy, threatening state security and violations of the computer crimes act," the official was quoted as saying.

The single mother's 19-year sentence was cut in half because she pleaded guilty.

Thai soldiers stand guard during a coup at the Army Club where ThailandImage copyrightReuters

Her lawyer Thanathorn Thananon said he had only heard of the sentence after it was handed down.

"The defendant was originally called in and charged with sedition for posting on Facebook that a counter-coup against the junta was imminent," he said, the Bangkok Post reports.

"Further investigation by the authorities found content that brought about lese majeste charges.

The military courts failed to inform us that a hearing was taking place. They only told the defendant to appear at short notice."

Since its coup last year, the military government has arrested a string of suspects, accusing them of claiming or using connections to the monarchy for personal benefit.

"Since Thailand's coup, it hasn't been hard to get thrown in jail for criticising the junta," Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch, told Reuters, referring to another lese majeste case.

"Now, all you have to do is press 'Like' on your Facebook page."

5. EMERGENCY SITUATIONS

Thailand's savage southern conflict

By Jonathan Head

15

BBC News, Bangkok

2 Jan 09

Five years ago, on the morning of 4 January 2004, a group of more than 50 Muslim militants stormed an army depot in Narathiwat province.

They killed four soldiers, took more than 300 weapons and burned 20 schools.

The incident marked a dramatic escalation of the decades-old conflict in the south between ethnic Malay separatists and Thai security forces.

Until that day the official view in Bangkok was that the insurgency had dwindled to an insignificant level.

Any violence was a consequence of the struggling and organised crime rife in the region.

So confident was then Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra of this that in 2002 he dismantled the Southern Border Provinces' Administrative Centre (SBPAC) which had co-ordinated government policy there since 1981, and the joint military-police security arrangements.

Instead, he put the police in charge. This proved a huge miscalculation.

The police stationed in the south lacked the experience and training to be effective.

Mr Thaksin and his cabinet were also poorly informed - they underestimated the rise of a new generation of young insurgents in the south, inspired by militant jihadism in other countries.

Mr Thaksin is now widely blamed for the renewed conflict, which has claimed around 3,500 lives since 2004.

After the coup that ousted him in 2006, the new military government promised a fresh approach, reviving the SBPAC.

But Amnesty International now argues that this has not improved the dire human rights situation in the south.

In a report published today it has documented a sharp increase in the use of torture by the security forces since mid-2007, when the military implemented a new battle plan to curb insurgent attacks.

Citing the cases of 34 people, the organisation says torture is now systematically used by the security forces in the south - it is not an occasional result of stressed troops overreacting.

This is despite torture being outlawed under the Thai constitution, and the government's repeated statements that it wants to win the "hearts and minds" of local Muslims.

In its report, Amnesty gives details of some harrowing incidents of torture: in one, a woman and her six-year-old son were both tortured to try to extract information about her husband.

Four of the people in the report died in custody.

Amnesty believes there are at least 21 unofficial detention centres in the south where detainees are mistreated, in addition to the two official prisons for insurgent suspects.

This, it says, makes it difficult for human rights groups to monitor abuses.

Neither local nor international groups are allowed regular access to these centres; even the International Committee of the Red Cross is not given access.

And during the first three days of detention, when torture is most likely to occur, prisoners are routinely denied visits by relatives or lawyers.

So why is this still happening, after the chorus of condemnation, even by the Thai military, of the hard-line approach under the Thaksin administrations from 2001 to 2006?

16

One cause must be the fear and frustration experienced by the 30,000 Thai soldiers now stationed in the south.

The insurgency remains secretive and remarkably poorly understood.

Knowledge of its structure and key personnel is very sketchy. It never admits responsibility for attacks.

And those attacks are relentless, and brutal: civilians have been beheaded and burned alive; school-teachers and Buddhist monks targeted; soldiers and police maimed and killed by double booby-traps, in which a smaller bomb is followed by a larger explosion to hit those assisting the earlier victims.

Another cause is the flood of paramilitary units into the south, which are less accountable, and more poorly trained, than many regular army units.

"We appreciate the gravity of the insurgency that the government is facing - we understand the pressure they are under," says Benjamin Zawacki, of AI's South East Asia team.

"But there are simply no circumstances under which torture is justified."

The new government in Thailand has, once again, promised a new approach to the south.

Foreign Minister Kasit Piromya has talked about creating a minister with special responsibility for the region, along the lines of Britain's Minister for Northern Ireland.

He has promised that a new body will replace the revived, but largely ineffective SBPAC which will supervise all military activities.

But the army commander, Gen Anupong Paochinda, has expressed his opposition to this plan. As a man who played a central role in putting the current Democrat-led coalition government together, his wishes are more likely to prevail.

The new government's resolve to improve official behaviour in the south has already been given a test.

Criminal charges?

On 25 December an inquest in Narathiwat ruled that torture by soldiers was responsible for the death in March 2007 of a local Muslim Imam, Yapa Kaseng, who was being held in custody.

The inquest names the soldiers responsible.

In the five years since the conflict flared up no security forces personnel have ever been charged with abusing or killing civilians, despite numerous well-documented cases.

Human rights campaigners in Thailand argue that this inquest must now be followed by criminal charges against those named in the verdict, for the government's claims of a new approach to have any credibility.

Last Updated: Wednesday, 4 January 2006, 16:19 GMT

Amnesty criticises Thai crackdown

Human rights group Amnesty International has condemned the Thai government's handling of Muslim unrest in the country's south.

Amnesty says authorities have used arbitrary detention, torture and excessive force while trying to deal with the spate of attacks.

They have also criticised government investigations into attacks on Muslim and Buddhist civilians.

But the army commander for the area said security had improved.17

The report comes on the second anniversary of the beginning of the unrest in Thailand's mostly-Muslim south, which began with an attack on an army depot in 2004. More than 1000 people have been killed since then.

"With regard to Pattani, Yala, and Narathiwat Provinces, Amnesty International is particularly concerned by the authorities' failure to conduct proper investigations into attacks on both Buddhist and Muslim civilians," the report said.

"Scores of villagers of both faiths told the organization that either no investigation was conducted whatsoever, or that a very cursory investigation took place."

The Amnesty report quoted former Thai Prime Minister Anand Panyarachun, the Chairman of the National Reconciliation Commission, as saying in July 2005 that "in 85% of murder cases, the government does not know who the perpetrators were".

The commission was set up last year after the Thai government admitted it had made mistakes in tackling the insurgency.

The report said no adequate protection had been given to villagers. Since the unrest began attacks have been carried out on schoolteachers and Buddhist monks as well as on government officials.

Thursday, 18 March, 2004, 14:30 GMT

Concern grows over Thai lawyer

By Kylie Morris

There is growing concern over the disappearance of a lawyer in Thailand associated with high profile cases involving members of the Islamic community.

The US-based group Human Rights Watch is the latest to call for police to step up their efforts to find the missing lawyer Somchai Neelahphaijit.

It is nearly a week since the prominent Muslim lawyer and human rights activist went missing in Bangkok.

Despite initial comments by the Thai prime minister suggesting a family quarrel might have played a part in Mr Somchai's disappearance, the justice ministry has now set up a special committee to investigate.

The 52-year-old lawyer had taken on the defence of two of four Thai Muslims accused of planning attacks for the Jemaah Islamiyah network and had reportedly told colleagues of receiving threats over the case.

He was also active in the campaign for the restoration of full legal rights for Thailand's mainly Muslim south.

Efforts are under way to collect 50,000 signatures to force the authorities to lift marshal law after it was imposed because of attacks on security forces.

The prime minister says there is no evidence that the authorities were involved in the lawyer's disappearance and has warned against blaming them, but Human Rights Watch says circumstances point to the possibility that he may have been taken into custody by Thai authorities.

Newspaper editorials in the capital have focused on that possibility, suggesting that the disappearance of those who take up causes opposed by the government only occurs in countries which are morally crippled and, they say, it cannot be allowed to happen here.

"Violence has increased to an extent where it affects almost all areas of life for local people, both Muslim and Buddhist, restricting their ability to work, travel, trade and receive education," the report said.

18

But the army commander, General Ongkorn Thongprasom, told the BBC's Thai service that 2005 was far better for human rights than the previous year.

"The human rights situation in the country... improved throughout the year," he said.

18 November, 2004, 14:40 GMT

Thailand's smile fades

By Dr Farish A Noor

In recent weeks the border between northern Malaysia and southern Thailand has seen an increase in inter-religious violence.

In the last month more than 80 Muslims were killed at a demonstration against the authorities. Since then nearly 30 Buddhists have been killed in what appear to be revenge attacks and killings.

Malaysian political scientist and human rights activist Farish A Noor reflects on the reasons for the rising violence.

As I crossed the border between Malaysia and Thailand, a huge poster stood before me.

It bore the image of a beaming woman and the slogan read: 'Welcome to Thailand, Land of Smiles'.

I've crossed the Thai-Malaysian border many times before, doing research on social and religious movements there.

As a Malaysian it's never seemed to me as a crossing into the unfamiliar.

The sights, sounds and smells are all the same: from the songbirds singing away in their colourful bamboo cages to the sickly-sweet smell of Durian fruit, an odour described to me by my wife as a combination of petrol and dustbin.

On the day that I crossed the border into Thailand through the seedy town of Golok, a man was shot in the back of his head and left dead, face-down, in front of the market.

Now this was not an isolated case of violence: for a year now Southern Thailand has been a hotbed of sporadic shootings and bombings.

This year alone, more than 500 people have been killed by both militant groups and the Thai security forces.

Everywhere I went I saw police and army roadblocks, manned by young soldiers who nervously kept their fingers on the triggers of their guns.

I tried to talk to one of the soldiers when I was in the town of Narathiwat, but as soon as I approached him he waved his gun at me and said "Go away, go away - don't stand there."

The poor fellow was clearly nervous of me on my motorbike, as many of the shootings that have taken place were drive-by killings with the assassins riding motorcycles.

The soldier looked like he was in his late teens - without his uniform, he could have passed as one of my students.

His fear, though, was real enough, for the situation in Pattani is rapidly deteriorating.

A few weeks ago a demonstration in the small town of Tak Bai turned ugly when the police tried to disperse the demonstrators.

The crowd had gathered in support of some local Muslim leaders who had been arrested on the grounds that they may have some links with the mysterious militants operating in the region.

In the chaos that followed, hundreds were arrested. Thai journalists recorded what happened next.

19

Ordered to strip down and lie on the ground, the protesters were then made to crawl on their bellies to the waiting trucks and crammed into them by the dozens.

Packed in like livestock they were piled on top of one another and then driven off to a detention centre five hours away.

In the course of the journey nearly 80 of the protesters suffocated to death or were crushed in the trucks.

Thailand's slide into inter-religious conflict seems to be part and parcel of the country's slide towards a more authoritarian form of politics.

When Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra came to power in 2001, he and his party claimed that they would restore law and order.

Their first campaign was against the drug cartels and criminal networks in the country.

As the campaign wore on, the body count rose. Local estimates put the figure of people killed at around 2,000 - many of whom were killed by the security forces in shoot-outs.

Following the Bali bombing in 2002 Thaksin was also one of the first leaders in the region to embrace President Bush's "global campaign against terror", and since then the security forces of Thailand have been on the hunt for alleged Islamic militants in the South.

Both Southern Thailand and Northern Malaysia were once part of a Malay-Muslim kingdom that was split apart thanks to the Anglo-Siamese Treaty of 1909.

The British colonial government claimed Kelantan and Pattani was unceremoniously handed over to the Thais.

I have come to know the area of Pattani-Kelantan quite well by now, thanks to my research there.

Pattani and Kelantan have failed to benefit from the economic development of Thailand and Malaysia and they remain among the poorest and most backward parts of the region.

At the markets of Southern Thailand one comes across goods that are typical of any poor rural locality - fruits and vegetables, fish and meat, farmers' tools and some local handicrafts.

Occasionally one runs into an Osama Bin Laden T-shirt as well.

At the local market I decided to interview a young man who was selling them.

"How's business?"' I asked him. "Oh, it's doing well" came the reply.

"Who buys these T-shirts?" was my next question.

He replied "Everyone. Lots of kids like them. We also sell them to dealers who come from Malaysia, Indonesia, Philippines.

"They buy them by the hundreds and then they sell them back home."

I asked him: "So do you support Osama too? I mean, would you be happy if people like these came here, and turned Thailand into a country like Afghanistan under the Taleban?"

He gave me a broad grin and said: "Oh no, no, noooo! I have a girlfriend man! I enjoy the motorbike races on the weekends and going out to have drinks with my friends, racing on the highways, playing computer games, and all that."

"So why do you sell these T-shirts then?" I asked him.

20

He replied: "It's simple man - we are fed up with what our government in Bangkok is doing to us. I mean, look at how poor we are.

"But Bangkok is more interested in supporting the Americans and the Americans hate Osama.

"So we wear the Osama T-shirt to say: 'We don't care about your policy with the United States. We have our own identity and we want you to respect it'."

During my recent trip to Pattani I had the distinct feeling that the mood had changed in the region.

The people were as poor as before, but also more angry about their state and what was happening in the world around them.

That impression was confirmed when I visited one of the local religious schools.

The school itself was a small wooden structure, a simple hut with a zinc roof.

The little boys who go to the school were just like kids anywhere else - playful and mischievous in their white robes and little green turbans.

But speaking to their teachers I sensed the tension that was beneath the surface.

One of the religious teachers said to me: "For years we were neglected and left behind. The government invested millions of dollars into Pattani, but where has the money gone?

And now the younger generation are getting angry and they're fighting back. We can't control them any longer."

So far those killed include the poor and the ordinary - policemen, teachers, farmers and monks.

Well if the religious leaders aren't controlling the angry young men, then who is?

I asked the teacher about the renewed violence in the region and he said:

"We don't know who's behind it, this is something new for all of us.

In the past our struggle was political, but now it's becoming a religious issue.

For so long the authorities turned a blind eye to all the smuggling that took place here, and now the whole area is swimming with guns and weapons.

The militants who are doing the killing are a small minority, but instead all of us Muslims are being blamed for it.

We feel that we are being victimised like Muslims all over the world, from Afghanistan to Iraq."

I noticed the teacher's clenched fists, as he talked about the abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison and Guantanamo Bay.

His final statement was telling: what began as a local problem has now become an international one, hence the popularity of Osama for a people who have never even heard of him before, and the relevance of events thousands of miles away in Iraq.

At another school I picked up a text entitled 'Jihad in Pattani', that spoke of a global campaign against Muslims the world over.

Thai security officers patrol the Pattani province

Security officers are now patrolling the troubled southern provinces

No one really knows where it was printed but the mysterious author of the text compared Pattani to Afghanistan and Iraq, and called for Muslims to unite against the United States of America.

21

In all my years of visiting and researching in Pattani, I have never read anything like it.

This is not the Pattani I once knew.

Back in my office and sitting in front of my computer, my mind went back to the young, smiling, boy selling his Osama T-shirts; racing on the highways with his girlfriend.

What would it take for him to cross that final, invisible line, and take Osama into his heart? What would drive anyone to express his frustration and anger through violence?

Already a spate of killings have claimed the lives of other innocents.

A few days after the deaths of the eighty Muslim protesters at Tak Bai, a Buddhist monk was murdered by militants who claimed that this was an act of revenge.

So far those killed include the poor and the ordinary - policemen, teachers, farmers and monks.

The body count continues to rise and the smiling girl on the poster no longer convinces.

Dr Farish A Noor is a Malaysian political scientist and human rights activist. He is the secretary general of the International Movement for a Just World and has studied the phenomenon of Islamist political movements in south-east Asia.

6. WAR ON DRUGS

20 April, 2001, 15:09 GMT 16:09 UK

Thai executions condemned

The public execution by firing squad of five convicts in Thailand has provoked strong criticism from human rights groups.

Four of those executed were major drug smugglers, reflecting the hardline approach to an escalating drug problem by the new government of Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra.

The fifth man had been convicted for masterminding a murder.

"It is outrageous for the new Thaksin government to flaunt its tough anti-drugs stance by executing people," London-based Amnesty International said.

"The death penalty provides no solution to growing crime rates... Instead it entrenches a culture of violence in society."

Thailand's Union for Civil Liberty also condemned the executions.

The executions come amid fears that the government is losing the battle against the rising drug problem, said to affect two million people out of the Thailand's population of 60 million.

Synthetic methamphetamine (speed) pills, made across the border in Burma, have flooded the country in recent years.

The police estimate that this year, 800 million of the highly-addictive tablets will enter Thailand - enough to give 12 pills to every person in the country.

"Ya Ba" or "crazy drug", has been described as the number one national security issue, particularly affecting the young.

In 1999, there were more than 660,000 cases of drug-related offences by students.

22

Amnesty said it recognised the "gravity of the illicit drug problem in Thailand" but added there was no evidence that the death penalty was a more effective deterrent.

But Prime Minister Thaksin has stood firm, saying the men had destroyed the future of a large number of young Thai people and deserved to die.

The authorities say they intend to speed up the execution of people condemned for drug offences.

The five men were executed on Wednesday by machine gunfire in Bangkwang Prison. Three were Thais, one Taiwanese and one a citizen of Hong Kong.

One man, Vichien Saenmahayak, 42, was found with 50,000 methamphetamine pills while another, Boonkerd Jitpranee, 40, was found with over 30kg of heroin.

Monday, 24 February, 2003, 11:17 GMT

Thai drugs war attacked

Thailand's human rights watchdog has urged the government to re-examine a crackdown on drug dealing which has led to the deaths of hundreds of people.

The latest victims included a nine-year-old boy whom police shot by mistake as they were chasing his mother, and a woman who was eight months pregnant.

Police have said they are responsible for the deaths of only 22 of the 600 people killed since the campaign started three weeks ago, and that they were acting in self-defence in each case.

But rights groups have said the execution-style killings suggest a shoot-to-kill policy.

Despite the death toll, polls showed that the policy was enjoying a high level of support among the Thai public. One Bangkok university poll on Sunday suggested 92% of respondents backed the approach.

The same survey did show, however, that seven out of 10 people feared being shot by police themselves.

The nine-year-old boy was shot on Sunday as police fired at his mother's car as she tried to escape following the arrest of the boy's father for possession of methamphetamines, police said.

Three police officers have been arrested on murder charges in relation to the case.

Thailand Rights Commissioner Surasee Kosolnavin condemned the way the government's anti-drugs campaign - dubbed "an eye-for-an-eye" by Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra - was being conducted.

"This is clearly a violation of human rights of innocent people," Mr Surasee told Reuters news agency.

"Law enforcement officers are supposed to provide safety to innocent people, not to threaten their lives," he said.

Mr Surasee said his commission had called on the prime minister to investigate whether police officers were operating within the law, and to find out what criteria they were using to place people on their suspects list.

Mr Thaksin himself has denied accusations that his government is encouraging a shoot to kill policy in order to meet tough targets to rid the country of methamphetamines.

The prime minister said on Friday that "everything had been done according to the law".

He argued that police have acted in self-defence.

"There is nowhere on earth that police ask suspects who are about to fire a gunshot to go to court first," the prime minister added.

Police have said the deaths were the result of inter-gang warfare. 23