Soldiers and police patrolled Bangkok’s streets yesterday in an effort to maintain calm a day after chaotic and bloody protests rocked the Thai capital, leaving two people dead and hundreds injured.
Dressed in khaki anti-riot gear, small groups of unarmed personnel from the army, navy and air force were deployed near key government buildings, including parliament — the focus of Tuesday’s violence between police and protesters.
Troops were largely monitoring empty avenues in the historic district, with few signs remaining of the unrest, when police fired tear gas at thousands of protesters and angry mobs retaliated with gunfire and fighting.
Thai Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat, a target of the anti-government People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD), defended the use of force as he toured a hospital to visit some of the 20 police injured in the clashes.
“The protesters wanted to seize parliament, so police used tear gas, which is an international practice,” he told reporters.
“Police are also wounded, and this clearly shows that the protests are not peaceful and protesters are not unarmed as claimed,” he said.
PAD leaders, however, expressed outrage at Tuesday’s crackdown, during which 443 people were injured, including eight who had to have damaged limbs amputated, the health ministry said in a statement.
One woman died of internal injuries, while a man was killed in a car bomb near parliament, the ministry statement said.
“The government is not legitimate. They are tyrants, They said they want reconciliation but they have made conflict,” PAD leader Somsak Kosaisuk said.
Pibhop Dhongchai, another protest leader, vowed they would carry on their campaign until Somchai and his Cabinet steps down. The PAD claims that the government is too close to ousted prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra.
Somchai is Thaksin’s brother-in-law, and Thailand’s old power elite in the palace and military — a mainstay of support for the PAD movement — resent the return of Thaksin’s allies.
The PAD also objects to the ruling People Power Party’s plans to amend the Constitution and claim they only came to power in December elections because of vote buying.
Pibhop said they were still considering their next move, but denied that they planned to send gangs of protesters to the foreign ministry, where Somchai earlier yesterday met foreign diplomats to reassure them about stability here.
Thailand’s media described the violence in cataclysmic terms yesterday — the English-language daily the Nation said the “mini civil war” had created a “bloodbath in Bangkok” — and accused police of aggravating the situation.
The recent unrest followed months of protests by the PAD, whose rallies in early 2006 contributed to the unrest culminating in the coup later that year that ousted Thaksin.
The army has sought to reassure people that despite the presence of troops in the streets, no fresh military takeover is in the works in Thailand, which has suffered 18 coups since the end of the absolute monarchy in 1932.
“Absolutely the military will not stage a coup,” army chief General Anupong Paojinda told reporters on Tuesday. “It’s not good for our country.”
The PAD in August occupied the prime minister’s office, and late on Monday thousands marched to parliament, where Somchai was due to give his first policy address to the house on Tuesday.
The prime minister, who has only been in the post for three weeks, has declared he will not resign or declare a state of emergency in the capital — although one of his deputies, Chavalit Yongchaiyudh, has already resigned.
The streets around parliament were almost deserted early yesterday, except for police deployed to sweep the area of debris and about 20 overturned cars left from the clashes.
Schools around parliament were closed, but in the rest of Bangkok, people went to work and continued their daily chores, seemingly unaffected by the unrest.
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