BANGKOK—Thai authorities say they will continue a peaceful approach in dealing with the thousands of red shirt anti-government protesters who have occupied a main business and shopping area in central Bangkok.
In the fourth week of ongoing rallies in the Thai capital, the red shirts on Saturday, April 5, took control of what is usually a busy intersection in the upmarket commercial part of the city. Since then, traffic into the surrounding area has been blocked and many businesses have been forced to shut their doors.
Via their mobile stage, red shirt leaders told thousands of followers that they will continue protesting until Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva dissolves parliament and calls an early election. Prime Minister Abhisit’s government, the red shirts say, came to power unlawfully and were installed by the Thai military and the bureaucratic elite.
The government, in response, has called the red shirt occupation of the business area illegal and also declared that protesters are banned from 11 major roads in Bangkok. However, Abhisit stated that force will not be used to evict the protesters.
Acting Thai government spokesperson Panitan Wattanayagorn, said that the government still intends to resolve the current situation through peaceful means.
Panitan said the police have distributed leaflets to the protesters informing them that the rally in this area is illegal and is not considered to be a peaceful demonstration as protected by the constitution.
One of the red shirts leaders, Weng Tojirakarn told The Epoch Times that he did not know how long they would stay in the business area.
“[We have] a collective leadership so that is why we must have a conference, a meeting, almost everyday in order to look at the situation and after that we then make decisions,” he said.
Other red shirt leaders have been quoted as saying they will branch out their protests to other parts of the city. On Monday, evening media reports stated they would travel the 11 roads that the where authorities have banned them from protesting.
Tensions were briefly ramped up on Monday when around a hundred protesters forced their way into the country’s Election Commission office accusing it of purposely stalling its investigations into alleged illegal political donations given to Prime Minister Abhisit’s Democrat Party. Following the foray, the red shirts again reiterated that their protests will remain peaceful.
The rallies in the commercial center follow other protests over the past weeks, which have included mass vehicle rallies and bizarre blood protests where red shirts splattered liters of their own blood on official buildings.
The red shirts—more formally known as the United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship’s (UDD)—are a loose coalition of supporters of fugitive former Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, as well as pro-democracy activists and ex-communists.
One of the key players in this political crisis, ousted PM Thaksin Shinawatra, has been addressing the protesters by video link on a regular basis from overseas. Thaksin is a billionaire businessman living in self-imposed exile to avoid corruption charges related to his time in office as prime minister. His government was ousted by a military coup in 2006.
In April last year, a red shirt rally in Bangkok got out of hand leaving two dead and scores injured.
