Pressuring a privy pivot point

It was recently reported that Thammasat University’s Sociology & Anthropology professor Anusorn Unno has submitted a letter of petition endorsed by 91 university lecturers, university students and others to Privy Council President Gen said Surayud Chulanontseeking his/palace intervention to save lese majeste political prisoners Tantawan Tuatulanond and Orawan Pupong.

He was “petitioned to immediately help put an end to a life-and-death crisis involving a couple of young women on a severe hunger strike.”

The act is said to be “unprecedented.”

Separate petitions including one endorsed with signatures of some 5,000 people have already been lodged in support of calls of human rights groups for reform of the judicial process and abolition of the lese majeste law in addition to the immediate, unconditional release of those political detainees.

It may seem odd to seek intervention from the very institution that is opposed by the hunger strikers. We guess that the idea is to point to the palace as the pivotal point in Article 112.