Category Archives: Corruption

Leicestershire English teacher abandoned by Kasem Bundit University, Bangkok

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47-year-old Leicester English teacher Gareth Davies languishes in a Thailand hospital

A Leicestershire English teacher’s commitment to his Thai students may cost him his life after falling ill in Bangkok, Thailand and then finding his employer, a private Bangkok university, hadn’t made the obligatory contributions it had been deducting from his salary to the country’s Social Welfare Fund, which guarantees medical cover for all legally employed staff. After five years teaching at Apex Works in Leicestershire, Gareth Davies from the village of Glennfield, set off to pursue his desire of teaching English as a second language in Thailand. About nine months ago the Leicestershire English teacher accepted an appointment to the department of English language for communications at Kasem Bundit University, one of Thailand’s numerous private universities, to teach English major … Continue reading →

Thaksin royal pardon has Thailand coup watchers on alert as the 9s line up again

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Thailand Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra on the campaign trail at Sara Buri - testing times ahead with royal decree application to pardon brother Thaksin. Photo: Courtesy PTP

After just 106 days in office the coming days promise to be a tense period for the government of Thailand’s Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra (ยิ่งลักษณ์ ชินวัตร), with conditions approaching ideal for the Royal Thai Army (กองทัพบกไทย) to mount the country’s 19th coup d’état since absolute monarchy rule was abolished 79 years ago. Already the subject of strong public criticism over the way in which her government has handled the 2011 Thailand flood, public anger at the government’s plan to request a royal pardon for prisoners, including her disgraced older brother fugitive former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra (ทักษิณ ชินวัตร), is drawing heated condemnation from those opposed to the disgraced former leader’s return. Royal pardon discussion on back of blatant lie The … Continue reading →

Jatuporn to be Yingluck’s first test on clean Thailand government

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Jatuporn Prompan address red-shirt suppporters at Ratchaprasong in May, 2010

For the past three years one of the most familiar faces at red-shirt rallies across Thailand has been that of United Front for Democracy (UDD) co-leader and former Pheu Thai Party (PTP) MP Jatuporn Prompan, now languishing in the Bangkok Remand Center and threatening to become the first real test of how clean the newly elected government of Yingluck Shinawatra will be. While red-shirt supporters welcomed former prime minister Abhisit Vejjajiva (อภิสิทธิ์ เวชชาชีวะ) fulfilling his promise to hold an early 2011 general election in Thailand, the dissolving of the Thai parliament also saw the removal of the parliamentary immunity veil that had prevented Jatuporn from joining fellow UDD leaders in jail following the collapse of the red-shirt protest in Bangkok … Continue reading →

Leaked cable shows USA influencing Thai law & justice system for 60 years

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Former USA ambassador to Thailand Eric G John

A confidential US Government cable allegedly sent by former American ambassador to Thailand Eric John (pictured at left) to US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton provides an interesting insight into how embedded US agencies are in the Southeast Asian kingdom and the role the super-power has had in manipulating domestic Thai policies. Labelled “Embassy Bangkok,CONFIDENTIAL,09BANGKOK611″ with the subject Law enforcement cooperation between Thailand and the United States runs deep, the 3,715 word leaked cable is one of more than 3,000 classified US government cables involving Thailand released by whistleblower organization Wikileaks, some of which have already been published on the website of former Reuters journalist Andrew Marshall. The March 20, 2009 leaked embassy cable covers more than 60-years of … Continue reading →

Red-shirts return to Ratchaprasong for anniversary of deadly 2010 crackdown

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The sons of (L to R) Paisol Tiplom (37) and Boontham Thongpui (47), killed in clashes during the 2010 red-shirt (เสือ้แดง) anti-government protest.

This story was updated at 6:45pm May 27, 2011. Additional/ edited text in blue type. One year after the violent military crackdown against red-shirt (เสือ้แดง) anti-government protesters in the heart of the Bangkok business district more than 10,000 of the groups faithful gathered at the Ratchaprasong intersection today, May 19, 2011, to mark the deaths of more than 90 people last April and May. Joining the gathering at the Ratchaprasong protest site were the families and loved-ones of those killed during the 69-day long protest which saw 92 people killed, including 11 soldiers and police and two foreign journalists, while another 1,800 sought treatment for injuries they sustained. Particularly moving were the blank, expressionless stares of the young children of … Continue reading →

Who killed Seh Daeng (ใครฆ่า เสธ.แดง)?

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After a year there is still no answer from the Thai government as to who shot Major-General Khattiya "Seh Daeng" Sawasdipol (ขัตติยะ "เสธ แดง" สวัสดิผล)

One year ago today as red-shirt (เสือ้แดง) protesters hunkered down behind fearsome looking bamboo and tire barricades blockading about 8 sq.km (3 sq.miles) of the central Bangkok business district, surrounded by heavily armed Royal Thai Army (RTA) (กองทัพบก) troops, one of the protest movements most colorful figures, RTA (กองทัพบก) specialist, Major-General Khattiya Sawatdiphon (ขัตติยะ สวัสดิผล), affectionately known as ‘Seh Daeng (เสธ.แดง)’ or ‘commander red’ by his legion of admirers died, victim of a single bullet fired from either the nearby Dusit Thani hotel or the building adjacent to it on Rama IV Road. Seh Daeng (เสธ.แดง) was shot while giving a media interview directly in front of the Lumphini Park entrance to the Silom MRT station, the light of the … Continue reading →

The secret kidnapping of David Rohde – How did the NY Times muffle the media?

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Kidnapped New York YTimes journalist David Rhode

Last week Pulitzer Prize winning and The New York Times (The Times) journalist, David Rohde escaped from seven months of Taliban captivity – without the world ever knowing he was held hostage. Rohde, along with local reporter Tahir Ludin and their driver, Asadullah Mangal, were abducted in Logar, outside Kabul, Afghanistan, on November 10, 2008, while he was researching a book about the history of America’s involvement there. Last week Rohde and Ludin managed to escape their captors by climbing over the wall of a compound where they were being held in the North Waziristan region of Pakistan – 165km (100 miles) from where he was captured. The two found a Pakistan Army scout, who led them to a nearby … Continue reading →