THOUSANDS GATHER IN THAILAND FOR ANTI-GOVERNMENT PROTEST

Wed 24 March 2021:

Several thousand people gathered in central Bangkok at a rally for reformation of the country’s monarchy, with demonstrators blocking one of the main intersections in the capital’s shopping district, local media reported on Wednesday.

The whole event was livestreamed by the Reporters online news agency on their Facebook page.

The demonstration started at 17:00 local time (10:00 a.m. GMT), after an hour the Ratchaprasong intersection was blocked to traffic. The rally ended at 21:00 as participants removed litter from the area before peacefully leaving the intersection.

A stage was erected in the middle of the road and decorated with a huge banner reading “Monarchy Reform.” Demonstrators held pictures of detainees and called on the government to “abolish 112,” referring to the royal defamation law, and release arrested opposition leaders.

Speakers often spoke of the “revolution,” though, as they clarified, it referred to the revolution in the mentality of the Thai people. According to one of the organizers, opposition leaders from the student movements do not aim to overthrow the monarchy, but rather seek to “return the monarchy under constitutional framework.”

“The wall that had existed between the monarchy and the people for centuries has already collapsed. We can now publicly declare things that no one could have even imagined possible a year or two ago.

We began criticizing the monarchy, and there is no turning back from that. The king is also human, he can make mistakes, and the people have an inalienable right to point out these mistakes to him,” one of the speakers said at the rally.

Though the action was not authorized, the police did not engage with the crowd, but warned that the demonstrators should disperse by 21:00. However, riot squads, roadblocks, water cannons and other equipment were seen in the vicinity.

The anti-government rally was led by the Thammasat University student group, United Front of Thammasat and Demonstration (UFTD), which is part of a larger student movement that has been at the forefront of Thailand’s political struggle since July 2020. Protesters have been clamoring against Prime Minister Prayut Chan-O-Cha’s government and demanding a rewrite of a military-scripted constitution, abolition of the country’s harsh royal defamation laws and reformation of the monarchy.

On Saturday, Thai police used water cannon and rubber bullets to disperse protesters outside Bangkok’s Grand Palace after the crowd broke through the barricades. Twenty protesters and 13 police officers were injured in the clash, 20 people were arrested and seven were charged with royal defamation. Currently, over 70 activists have been arrested under the lese majeste law.

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