Yellow-shirts mark anniversary of clashes with police

[Mentors]

Thousands of People's Alliance for Democracy supporters rallied in Bangkok on Wednesday to mark the first anniversary of the violent police suppression of the Oct 7 protest, which left one PAD protester dead and around 400 injured.

 

On Oct 7 last year, the yellow-shirt demonstrators gathered and demanded the resignation of the Somchai Wongsawat administration, headed by fugitive ousted premier Thaksin Shinawatra's then brother-in-law.

Police dispersed the crowd by repeatedly firing volleys of teargas at the protesters as they marched on the parliament. A young woman was hit by a teargas shell and later died. An inquiry found faulty Chinese teargas was used.

 

A retired policeman, a PAD supporter, also died some distance away when his parked car exploded. It was speculated he accidentally set off a bomb.

 

About 5,000 people, wearing black, gathered at the Royal Plaza in the morning to peacefully mark the anniversary. Led by PAD core members Sondhi Limthongkul and Maj-Gen Chamlong Srimuang, they offered food to 193 monks in tribute to the victims of last year's violence.

 

"We regard those who died during our fight, and the many hundreds who lost their limbs and became blind, as our heroes," Mr Sondhi, who was elected the leader of the New Politics Party at its first general meeting on Tuesday, told the crowd.

 

"We will not allow your fight to be wasted. We will keep on fighting to uphold our nation, the legality of the state and the constitutional monarchy."

 

Mr Sondhi also said they would track down and bring to justice "the culprits who brutally suppressed our heroes".

 

They then marched to the Democracy Monument to voice their opposition to the plan to amend the 2007 constitution shortly before 11am.

 

Pol Col Piya Uthayo, police deputy spokesman, said a close watch was being kept on the PAD’s movements. At least 1,350 police were deployed to maintain law and order at the Royal Plaza and roads leading to the Democracy Monument.

 

In the afternoon, the group marched to the main auditorium of the Thammasat University to mark the Oct 7 bloodshed.

 

Core members of the PAD received a backing from thousands of PAD members to stage a major rally against the ongoing attempt by members of parliament to amend the 2007 constitution.

 

Pibhop Dhongchai, a PAD leader, said core members of the alliance will meet again to set a date for a major rally against charter amendment.

 

The PAD's protests peaked last year with an economically crippling ten-day seizure of Bangkok's two main airports from late November, which effectively toppled the pro-Thaksin government.

 

The PAD's new political wing, the New Politics Party, has announced a policy to promote a "clean politics" free from corruption, which it has symbolized by adding green to the usual yellow of its logo.

 

Thaksin, who was twice elected to office and removed by the military amid widespread allegations of rampant corruption in his government, is still supported by the rival red-shirts. He fled the kingdom in August last year to avoid a two-year jail term for abuse of power.

 

The country remains deeply divided between his mainly rural supporters and his foes in the Bangkok-based power cliques of the palace, military and bureaucracy, who have tacitly supported the yellow-clad protesters.

 

http://www.bangkokpost.com/news/politics/156356/yellow-shirts-mark-anniversary-of-clashes-with-police