Source:
https://scmp.com/news/asia/article/1354187/yingluck-shinawatra-pleads-bangkok-rallies-end-after-amnesty-defeated Asia
Thai PM Yingluck pleads for rallies to end after amnesty defeated
A proposed amnesty that could have allowed former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra to return to Thailand has been voted down by the country's Senate
Thai opposition protesters during a rally at the Democracy Monument in Bangkok on Monday. Photo: AFP
Thai premier Yingluck Shinawatra appealed on Tuesday for anti-government groups to end ongoing street protests after the parliamentary defeat of an amnesty bill failed to defuse political tensions.
The bill, which critics say was aimed at allowing divisive former premier Thaksin Shinawatra to return home from self-exile, was rejected by senators in a unanimous vote late Monday.
Anger over the amnesty proposal saw around 50,000 people cluster in the political heart of Bangkok late into the night, with some 2,500 anti-government protesters remaining on the streets early on Tuesday.
The opposition Democrat Party, which is seen as benefiting from the protests, has called for a three-day nationwide strike starting on Wednesday despite assurances from the ruling Puea Thai party not to revive the bill.
Prime Minister Yingluck – who is Thaksin’s sister – urged demonstrators to reject the strike and end their protest.
“As many of their demands have been met, I plead for those protesting to stop,” she told reporters, appealing to the public to give her government time to run the country.
Riot police secure an area outside government house as Thai opposition protesters attend an anti-government rally. Photo: AFP
The visceral reaction to the proposed amnesty has brought a new round of street politics in Thailand, where several bouts of rival protests since Thaksin’s government was deposed in an army coup in 2006 have periodically brought chaos to the kingdom.
“The Democrats are now trying to enable conditions on the street to prod a judicial intervention ... to upend Yingluck’s government,” said Thitinan Pongsudhirak, director of the Institute of Security and International Studies at Bangkok’s Chulalongkorn University.
Predicting the anti-government protesters will try to hold their ground until early December, Thitinan described the situation “as extreme brinkmanship” aimed at “provoking Yingluck’s government into an over-reaction”.
Former Thai Deputy Prime Minister Suthep Thaugsuban, leader of the anti-government movement. Photo: Xinhua
Their group, made up mainly of Thaksin supporters, has also been riled by the proposed amnesty, saying it would have absolved key Democrat leaders of blame for their alleged roles in a deadly crackdown on a red-shirt movement protest in 2010.
Thaksin is a hugely polarising figure in Thailand, drawing great support largely from the rural and urban poor but hatred from many of the Bangkok middle and upper classes.
He was toppled by royalist generals in 2006 and lives in exile to avoid prison for a corruption conviction that he contends was politically motivated.