Remembering victims of royalism

Almost a year ago, it was reported that the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) had submitted an investigation report about nine self-exiled political activists who have disappeared in neighboring countries to the Ministry of Justice.

That report claimed that “the NHRC had investigated complaints regarding nine missing persons who sought political asylum in Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam between 2017 and 2021.” This apparently refered to Ittipon Sukpaen, Wuthipong Kochathamakul, Surachai Danwattananusorn, Chucheep Chivasut, Kritsana Thapthai, Siam Theerawut, Wanchalearm Satsaksit, Chatcharn Buppawan and Kraidej Luelert. The latter two are confirmed dead – murdered – and it is presumed that Surachai and Wanchalerm were also murdered, and perhaps others too. The two confirmed dead were tortured, disemboweled, and their bodies stuffed with concrete before they were thrown in the Mekong River.

The NHRC urged the Puea Thai Party-led  government to seriously pursue the cases.

Of course, it has done nothing.

It is widely believed that the missing and murdered activists were victims of the previous military/military-backed royalist regime, certainly with the support of neighboring governments, and perhaps with palace connivance. These activists had mostly fled following the 2014 military coup.

As Prachatai states, it is now six years since the body of Chatcharn or Comrade Phuchana, was found in the Mekong River in December 2018:

The trail has since gone cold. No progress has so far been made in the investigation into his death. But his family must go on living. To keep the fire burning, each December, Phuchana’s family members and their friends gather at his home in Mukdahan to celebrate and heal, so that they can go on despite the fading hope of justice for political exiles and enforced disappearance victims.

This is the documentary produced of the most recent of those remembrances: