Thailand’s prime minister yesterday named a former attorney general to head an investigation into last month’s deadly street violence, sparking a row with the opposition, which said it feared a whitewash.
Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva said Kanit Nanakorn would set up an independent panel to probe clashes between armed troops and “Red Shirt” anti-government protesters that left 89 people dead, most of them civilians.
“I have given Kanit full independence to select his members and conduct the investigation,” he told reporters.
PHOTO: EPA
The opposition Puea Thai party, however, called for international watchdogs to take the lead in the inquiry, saying a probe headed by Kanit would probably be a “whitewash.”
“It’s difficult to accept Kanit as chairman of this committee as he’s very close to government figures and was selected by Abhisit, who ordered troops to crack down on protesters,” spokesman Pormpong Nopparit said. “If the government wants all groups in Thailand and worldwide to accept the findings, it should invite international organizations to act as investigators.”
Kanit, 73, is the dean of law at Dhurakij Pundit University.
He headed a probe into alleged extrajudicial killings of 2,500 people during a war on drugs under ex-prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, who was ousted in a 2006 coup and is idolized by many Red Shirts.
The Reds Shirts’ rally, broken up on May 19 in an army assault on their vast encampment in the heart of Bangkok, sparked outbreaks of violence where nearly 1,900 were injured.
The government has defended the use of armed troops, saying they were only authorized to fire live ammunition as warning shots, in self-defense or against “terrorists” whom it has accuses of inciting the unrest.
The Red Shirts were campaigning for elections they hoped would oust the government, which they view as undemocratic because it came to power with the backing of the army after a court ruling threw out the previous administration.
Speaking on the sidelines of an economic forum in Vietnam on Sunday, Abhisit said he wanted somebody who was sympathetic to the Red Shirts in the panel “to make sure that all sides can be confident of the neutrality of their work.”
Abhisit has pledged to accept the findings of the probe.
“If the findings of the investigation suggest that I should take responsibility for whatever decisions, I will do that,” he told a press conference on May 29.
UN human rights chief Navi Pillay called last week for an independent investigation into the deadly unrest and for “all those found responsible for human rights violations are held to account.”
New York-based Human Rights Watch has accused both the Thai security forces and the protesters of committing “serious abuses” during the troubles, the country’s worst political violence in decades.
Meanwhile, police said yesterday they had arrested a Red Shirt guard in connection with an arson attack on the kingdom’s biggest shopping mall last month.
Saichon Paebua, 28, from Chainat Province, was arrested in Bangkok late on Monday for his alleged involvement in the fire at Central World mall, which was left gutted by the blaze and partly collapsed.
A Bangkok district court issued his arrest warrant on June 1 after he was seen in photographs breaking glass windows and walking inside the mall on the afternoon of May 19, the day of the blaze.
Saichon confirmed he was the person in the footage but denied arson charges.
“He can deny but police will send him to the court as we have clear evidence against him,” said King Kwangwisetchaicharn, commander of Chanasongkram Police station in Bangkok.
Police have issued three other warrants for suspected arsonists.
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