New arrest warrant issued against former Thai PM

By Max Constant

BANGKOK

A Thai criminal court has issued an arrest warrant against former Thai prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, after he failed to answer a summons to appear before judges on charges of defaming the army.

At a hearing Monday, the judge decided to issue the warrant after Shinawatra’s lawyer said his client could not be present as he was living in exile.

The case has a statute of limitations of ten years.

The defamation case relates to an interview Shinawatra gave to Korean daily Chosun Ilbo last May in which he implicitly criticized the military who overthrow the government of his sister, Yingluck Shinawatra, last year.

Shinawatra said “it is regrettable that politics is moving backwards only in Thailand when advances are being made across the world.”

He added: “what the [Thai] military want and what the general public wants are different. What I mean is that the people should not be seen as subordinates.”

Shinawatra, who led Thailand from 2001 until he was overthrown in a Sept. 2006 coup was sentenced to two years in jail in 2008 for abuse of power in a case related to the purchase of land purchase by his wife when he was prime minister.

He fled Thailand a few weeks before the judgment and has been living in exile since, mostly in Dubai.

In May, Shinawatra further risked the junta's ire when he told a leadership conference in Seoul that the performance of the junta after one year in power was “not so impressive”.

At first, junta leader-cum-prime minister Prayuth Chan-ocha said he did not care about Shinawatra’s words, but Gen. Sarayuth Klinmahom, director of the office of the judge advocate of the Thai army, later filed a case for defamation, which was accepted by the criminal court.

On Oct. 5, a military spokesman read a statement by Chan-ocha on Thai television accusing Shinawatra -- albeit without using his name directly -- of fanning the flames of political angst that have affected the country over the last few years.

“If that person confessed and faced justice from the start, there would not have been problems,” he claimed, in an apparent reference to Shinawatra’s 2008 conviction.

“There would be no junta today and people would not have died because of the unknown militants -- and we all know whom they support."

On May 19, 2010, the military attacked a camp of pro-Thaksin demonstrators -- known as "Red Shirts" -- and killed scores of them.

Among the demonstrators were a few armed militants -- often referred to as "Black Shirts" -- who returned fire, killing and injuring a few soldiers.