Up to about 2 million voters were expected to submit advance ballots yesterday in Thailand’s first election since the kingdom was rocked by its worst civil violence in decades last year.
About 2.4 million of 46 million eligible voters registered for advance votes ahead of Sunday’s poll, with opinion surveys showing the ruling Democrats lagging behind a resurgent opposition.
The vote is seen as a key test of whether Thailand can finally draw a line under the political crisis that has gripped the nation since the army ousted former Thai prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra in a 2006 coup.
Although he lives abroad to avoid a jail term for corruption, Thaksin is widely seen as the de facto leader of the main opposition Puea Thai Party and his youngest sister is the frontrunner to be prime minister.
“I hope this election will bring peace and order because it is the voice of the people,” 18-year-old student and first-time voter Porntiwa Promjit said after casting her ballot in Bangkok.
Parties linked to Thaksin have won the most seats in the past four elections, but the courts reversed the results of the last two polls. Even if the army and courts do not intervene again, there are fears that at least one of the rival protest movements might take to the streets once more if their side loses, leading to fresh turmoil.
Mass anti-government protests by Thaksin’s “Red Shirt” supporters last year triggered a military crackdown that left more than 90 people dead in street clashes between protesters and troops.
Meanwhile, Thailand has withdrawn from UNESCO’S World Heritage Convention because of a row with Cambodia over the 900-year-old Preah Vihear temple, Natural Resource and Environment Minister Suwit Khunkitti said in Paris.
Suwit said that Thailand took the decision because the convention agreed to put Cambodia’s proposed management plan for the temple on its agenda.
Two clashes over the temple earlier this year killed 28 people.
Republican US lawmakers on Friday criticized US President Joe Biden’s administration after sanctioned Chinese telecoms equipment giant Huawei unveiled a laptop this week powered by an Intel artificial intelligence (AI) chip. The US placed Huawei on a trade restriction list in 2019 for contravening Iran sanctions, part of a broader effort to hobble Beijing’s technological advances. Placement on the list means the company’s suppliers have to seek a special, difficult-to-obtain license before shipping to it. One such license, issued by then-US president Donald Trump’s administration, has allowed Intel to ship central processors to Huawei for use in laptops since 2020. China hardliners
Conjoined twins Lori and George Schappell, who pursued separate careers, interests and relationships during lives that defied medical expectations, died this month in Pennsylvania, funeral home officials said. They were 62. The twins, listed by Guinness World Records as the oldest living conjoined twins, died on April 7 at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, obituaries posted by Leibensperger Funeral Homes of Hamburg said. The cause of death was not detailed. “When we were born, the doctors didn’t think we’d make 30, but we proved them wrong,” Lori said in an interview when they turned 50, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported. The
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