Marwaan Macan-Markar, of IPS, has written an important and chilling story. Citing official Thai government data, he reports that there are :
” …scores of Thais whose cases for allegedly violating the law seeking to protect this nation’s royal family were submitted last year to the lower courts across the country – and largely remain hidden from the public. The courts accepted a record 164 lese majeste cases in 2009, based on data from the office of the judiciary seen by IPS. Sixty-nine of the alleged violations have been submitted to courts in the central region, followed by 37 in the north-east provinces and 12 in the eastern provinces, according to the still to be published data.”
This is an incredible number of people who are being accused of lese majeste. Who are these people? Why are their cases being silenced? And what will the effects of this silencing be? PPT’s opinion is that the silence around these cases is one more symptom of the growing crisis in Thailand.
Read the entire article here: 14 May 2010, “Lese Majeste Cases Rise, but Public in the Dark”
Political Prisoners in Thailand 