THAILAND
Kingdom of
Thailand
Head of state:
King Bhumibol
Adulyadej
Head of
government: Thaksin Shinawatra
Death penalty:
retentionist
International Criminal
Court: signed
Five people were
executed by machine-gun fire during 2002. At least 17 others were
sentenced to death, bringing the total number of people under
sentence of death at the end of the year to more than 600. Over
130,000 mostly Karen and Karenni refugees from Myanmar were living
in refugee camps near the border, while Shan refugees were not
allowed into camps. In February police announced that they had
discovered the bodies of some 20 Karen migrant workers.
Investigations were initiated into these murders but the results
were not known at the end of the year. Land rights disputes
continued in many parts of the country, including Lamphun, Ubon
Ratchathani, Chiang Rai, Chiang Mai, and Songkla provinces. The
rights of hill tribe people without full Thai citizenship to land,
health care, and education continued to be extremely
limited.
Background
In March the government
initiated a crack-down on the media, including foreign
publications. The same month the Anti-Money Laundering Office
launched investigations into the financial activities of Thai
journalists critical of the government, in what was widely viewed
as a politically motivated move.
In May the Shan State
Army-South (SSA-South), an armed opposition group based in Myanmar,
attacked Myanmar military bases near the Thai border. In response
the Myanmar government closed the border between Myanmar and
Thailand. The border was not reopened until October. The United Wa
State Army (UWSA), a Myanmar-based armed opposition group which
agreed a cease-fire with the government and was widely believed to
be involved in illegally bringing methamphetamine drugs into
Thailand, and the Thai army engaged in skirmishes in March, April,
and May. Battles between Myanmar armed forces and armed opposition
groups spilled over into Thai territory during the year,
temporarily displacing Thai civilians.
Death penalty
Five people were executed in
Bangkwang Maximum Security Prison, where all executions take place.
Three had been convicted of murder and two of drugs trafficking.
New legislation providing for the method of execution to be changed
from machine-gun fire to lethal injection and also disallowing the
execution of anyone under the age of 18 was promulgated in
November. Some 70 per cent of the over 600 people under sentence of
death had reportedly been convicted of drug-related
charges.
Torture and
ill-treatment
Three Karenni refugees, one
of whom was 15 years old, were raped by soldiers in March. The
women were attacked while they were gathering vegetables outside
Karenni refugee Camp 2 near Mae Hong Son. Three soldiers were
arrested in connection with the attack and remained in detention
but at the end of the year it was not known if they had been tried
and sentenced.
Overcrowding in prisons and
the shackling of death-row prisoners continued although the
Corrections Department took steps to reform the prison system,
including training prison guards in human rights. Almost 260,000
people were reportedly held in prisons designed to hold some
100,000 prisoners. Cells in prisons and police stations were in
some cases so crowded that inmates could not lie down on the floor
to sleep at the same time. In April, 15 juveniles who had escaped
from the Baan Ubekkha Juvenile Detention Centre, Samut Prakan
Province, said that they had been ill-treated there.
Prisoner of
conscience
Sok Yoeun, a Cambodian
refugee and prisoner of conscience in poor health who was arrested
in Thailand in 1999 for "illegal immigration", continued
to be detained and remained at risk of being extradited to
Cambodia. In November a court ruled that he should be extradited;
his lawyers immediately appealed against the decision.
Ethnic minorities and rural
people
Twenty-six farmers and land
rights activists were arrested in Lamphun Province in April and
May; some were charged with over 40 offences, including
trespassing. By the end of the year all had been released on bail
and an unknown number were standing trial. The 26 were arbitrarily
arrested and seven were detained without bail for six weeks in
extremely overcrowded conditions. The authorities claimed that the
farmers were cultivating privately owned land, although there was
compelling evidence of widespread corruption in issuing land deeds
for property and that some of the land had originally been given to
farmers by the authorities.
In September a group of
elderly villagers protesting against the Pak Mun Dam project were
dragged from Ubon Ratchathani town hall and roughly treated by
inebriated paramilitary forces. In December their protest sites in
Bangkok and at the Pak Mun Dam in Ubon Ratchathani Province were
destroyed by unidentified assailants amid protests that the
government did not protect the protesters. Also in December, police
clashed with demonstrators in Hat Yai, Songkla Province, southern
Thailand, when the latter gathered in order to hand over a petition
to the Prime Minister protesting against the construction of a
natural gas pipeline from Malaysia to Thailand. Members of both
groups were injured amid claims that the police had charged
peaceful protesters with batons. The National Human Rights
Commission initiated an investigation.
Human rights
defenders
Human rights defenders,
particularly land rights activists, were subjected to surveillance,
harassment, and intimidation.
□ In July a hill tribe
leader belonging to the Akha tribe was arrested by police without a
warrant at the Chiang Mai airport and taken to her house which was
then ransacked by police. After the police left her property she
and her family experienced threats and other forms of harassment
for several months.
□ In June unidentified
gunmen shot at a farmer and village leader in Chai Prakan district,
Chiang Mai Province. He survived the attack although he was hit in
the chest. By the end of the year, an investigation into the
incident had not been completed by the police and the leader was in
hiding.
□ A leader of the Pak
Mun Dam protesters continued to be denied a passport and continued
to receive anonymous threats.
Migrant workers, refugees and
asylum-seekers
Police announced in February
that they had found in western Tak Province the bodies of more than
20 migrant workers belonging to the Karen ethnic minority from
Myanmar . Their throats had been cut. They had been blindfolded and
their wrists were tied behind their backs. No one had been brought
to justice in connection with their murders by the end of the
year.
In March the bodies of 13
migrant workers from Myanmar were found in Prachin Buri Province.
Preliminary investigations indicated that they had been dumped
there after suffocating to death hidden under a load of vegetables
in a truck. By the end of the year, it was not known if anyone had
been brought to justice.
Two separate groups of
migrant workers and dissidents from Myanmar were arrested in August
and again in December in Sangklaburi, Kanchanaburi Province,
bordering Myanmar. In each instance both groups were released a few
days after their arrest.
Refugees from Myanmar
continued to arrive in significant numbers and stayed in camps
along the Myanmar border, although the government refused to
register them. Shan refugees, who also continued to enter the
country in large numbers, were still denied access to refugee
camps.
In December the newly
appointed National Security Council Chief announced that Thailand
would begin forcibly returning asylum-seekers from neighbouring
countries to their country of origin.
AI country
reports/visits
Reports
• Thailand: Widespread
abuses in the administration of justice (AI Index: ASA
39/003/2002)
• Thailand: 10 years
later – still no justice for the May 1992 victims (AI Index:
ASA 39/004/2002)
Visits
AI delegates visited Thailand
in February, March and November.
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