Thai protesters target ministries, threaten stock market in Bangkok
Print Edition
Protesters trying to topple Thailand’s government tightened a blockade around ministries yesterday and their leaders warned the prime minister that she could be targeted next, as some saw more than two months of turmoil inching toward an endgame.
Major intersections in Bangkok were blocked for a second day, and a hardline faction of the agitators threatened to storm the stock exchange in the Thai capital.
Protest leaders say demonstrators will occupy Bangkok’s main arteries until an unelected “people’s council” replaces Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra’s administration, which they accuse of corruption and nepotism.
The unrest is the latest chapter in an eight-year conflict pitting the Bangkok-based middle class and royalist establishment against the mostly poorer, rural supporters of Yingluck and her brother Thaksin Shinawatra, a former premier ousted by the military in 2006.
Although Bangkok was calm and the mood among the tens of thousands of protesters remained festive, analysts said the scope for a peaceful resolution of the crisis ahead of elections called for February 2 was narrowing.
“There is no clear way out,” the International Crisis Group think-tank said in a report. “As anti-government protesters intensify actions, the risk of violence across wide swathes is growing and significant.”
Ministries and the central bank have been forced to operate from back-up offices after protesters led by Suthep Thaugsuban stopped civil servants getting to work.
“In the next two or three days we must close every government office,” Suthep told a crowd of supporters. “If we cannot, we will restrict the movements of the prime minister and other ministers. We will start by cutting water and electricity to their homes. I suggest they evacuate their children.”
Demonstrators marched peacefully from their seven big protest camps to ministries, the customs office, the planning agency and other state bodies yesterday, aiming to paralyze the workings of government.
A student group allied to Suthep’s People’s Democratic Reform Committee threatened to attack the stock exchange, with faction leader Nitithorn Lamlua telling supporters on Monday it represented “a wicked capitalist system that provided the path for Thaksin to become a billionaire.”
Jarumporn Chotikasathien, president of the Stock Exchange of Thailand, said emergency measures had been prepared to secure the premises and trading systems. Trading was normal with the index up nearly 1.0 percent at the close.
There was no special security visible at the exchange. One group of protesters marched past on their way to the customs department but did not stop.
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