Who does the king want?

The election may still be some way off, but the issue of the palace and preferred outcome is already being pondered.

A recent article in Nikkei Asia by Marwaan Macan-Markar gets to the point, quoting an unnamed military intelligence source, who see 2023 as different from 2019: “But we should expect a twist this time…”. That has to do with Gen Prayuth Chanocha’s and Gen Prawit Wongsuwan’s “diminishing influence … over the army in recent years.”

Three army generals in 2019. Clipped from the Bangkok Post

This also saw rising palace influence: “Seasoned security analysts point to the annual promotions of the estimated 1,750 flag officers that signal this shift. Neither Prayuth nor Prawit, they say, played a significant role in the elevation of Gen. Narongphan Jitkaewthae, a palace favorite, to a three-year term as the army chief.”

Supalak Ganjanakhundee is cited as saying that Prawit “suffers” because “he is not close to the palace…”. Marwaan reckons “Bangkok-based diplomats have expressed similar sentiments during background discussions about palace favorites.”

Supalak added: “[Prawit] retired from the defense service a long time back and currently holds no ministerial posts to command the military,… [Prayuth did not] assign Prawit to take care of [any] security matters or anything related to the military.”

Prayuth remains “head of the Internal Security Operations Command, a Cold War relic that serves as the political arm of the military. Political insiders interviewed by Nikkei said that ISOC’s role will come under scrutiny — whether it will side with Prayuth’s camp over Prawit’s for the elections.”

There’s also “chatter in the barracks among conscripts, young soldiers and even captains, all under 30 years old, who favor opposition parties such as the pro-youth Move Forward and the pro-democracy Pheu Thai, according to military insiders.”

Of course, the palace abhors Move Forward and worries about Puea Thai and Thaksin Shinawatra.

Two more brave women v ISOC

Teeranai Charuvastra has a useful report at The Nation on “civil rights activists Angkhana Neejapaijit and Anchana Heemmina” who have been “hounded by online trolls” for years because of their efforts to promote human rights, call out torture, demand state responses on enforced disappearances and more. Most of all, the trolls wanted to discredit “their call for transparency in southern border provinces.”

It was clear that the trolls’ accounts were “manufactured” to discredit:

… among the faceless social media accounts, one stuck out: a website called Pulony, which purportedly “tells the truth” about the Deep South. In reality, as the two women told the press recently, the site has engaged in smear campaigns against Angkhana and Anchana for years, casting them as paid agents, provocateurs and sympathisers of insurgents out to undermine the military’s peace-building efforts.

Interestingly, in a 2020 parliamentary debate, opposition MPs “were grilling the authorities for what they described as internal documents within the Internal Security Operation Command (Isoc) seeking funding for its propaganda campaigns. One of the investors was the Pulony website.”

Speaking at the Foreign Correspondent’s Club of Thailand, Anchana said:

“We are just two women who work for human rights…. Yet we watched a government agency ask the government to cover the cost of its attacks on us. That’s just wrong.”

Teeranai observes that “the IO targeting them was not run by any political groups or politicians seeking to win votes, but the state itself.”

Their response was to file “a lawsuit with the Civil Court in November 2020 seeking damages from Isoc. They named the quasi-military counter-insurgency agency as being at the heart of the disinformation warfare wielded by Pulony.”

Revealingly, the “website appeared to have stopped operating soon after the lawsuit was filed but remains accessible to this day.” What remains deals in conspiracy theories and global extreme right propaganda:

In one of its last entries, the website rehashed a common conspiracy theory claiming that human rights activists in the deep South, environmentalists, digital privacy advocates, and the news outlet Prachatai – where I work – are really part of the same network paid by George Soros and other external influences to sabotage Thailand.

“This is the model of sabotage that’s influenced by foreign money to devastate [Thailand’s] economy, politics and society, in order to seek interest on behalf of global politics,” the post said. “And some Thais who have no morals have agreed to be the tools of foreign powers to murder their own country.”

ISOC has gone Sgt Schulz and “denied any responsibility….[offering] I”an incredibly lame defence.”

I know nothing

Both Facebook and Twitter closed hundreds of accounts linked to the military.

But the regime’s people still have the judiciary in their pocket:

The verdict on Pulony was returned earlier this week, much to the disappointment of Angkhana and Anchana.

The court ruled that the plaintiff could not prove beyond reasonable doubt that Isoc was indeed operating the website, citing the lack of technical evidence like web traffic data – something Angkhana and Anchana said is near impossible for them to obtain.

Of course, this standard of evidence does not apply in lese majeste and computer crimes cases.

The two women are not deterred. “Anchana said the lawsuit already achieved its goal of raising public awareness about the existence of IOs and the attempts to hold them accountable, especially those engineered by state entities.”

Parliament’s truths

The current debate in parliament has been interesting.

We at PPT were especially pleased to learn that Move Forward MP Amarat Chokpamitkul had called “for abolition of the army-led Internal Security Operations Command.”

She correctly observed that the “army-led agency has conducted missions against the people with opposing views, … brainwashed schoolchildren … to the extent that they develop hostility toward pro-democracy activists who may be indiscriminately viewed by the military as somehow detrimental to the monarchy.” Amarat calculates that “230,000 schoolchildren in the provinces have been recruited so far under the ISOC brainwashing campaign in the name of Thai Volunteers For National Defence…”.

She went further, calling for an amnesty for those facing sedition and lese majeste charges.

Meanwhile, another Move Forward MP, Padipat Santipada, pointed to coup leaders Gen Prayuth Chan-ocha, Gen Prawit Wongsuwan, and Gen Anupong Paojinda as having “failed to combat corruption in the army…”, and with turning a blind eye to the culture of corruption in the military and police.

Corruption now has its tentacles in every Thai’s purse.

Both MPs raise important points, pointing to the decay within the regime and its ability to stay in power: corrupt money aids brainwashing and turns elections.

Repression of monarchy reformists

DW recently had a story that sought to assess where the democracy/monarchy reform movement is more than two years after the movement spectacularly burst on the scene.

In essence, the story is that the monarchy reform movement has been so repressed that it is difficult for activists to engage in political advocacy.

Clipped from Prachatai

The youth-led protest movement, “calling for constitutional reforms to rein in far-reaching powers of the country’s monarchy” and for the resignation of Gen Prayuth Chan-ocha, “inspired hundreds of thousands of people across Thailand…”.

But, over two years later, the military-backed, pro-monarchy regime has managed to silence many and drain the movement of energy.

The repression that has dogged activists has resulted in lese majeste charges in the hundreds, long jail terms for some, and the development of a surveillance state that weighs China-like on anyone deemed a “threat.” The regime increasingly relies on cyber snoops and ultra-royalists, many of them with links to the military and ISOC, to bring complaints that result in charges, arrest, and detention.

Arnon. Clipped from Prachatai

For example, human rights lawyer and activist Arnon Nampa, faces at least 14 lese majeste charges, and was detained for more than 200 days without bail. Other activists are kept busy fighting a myriad of charges.

Democracy activist Patsaravalee Tanakitvibulpon explains: “Many of our friends are still detained…. Some have been held for more than 200 days.” As DW has it, “there are [now] at least 11 political detainees, including three on lese majeste cases.”

Patsaravalee reckons “the government had made people ‘numb and accustomed’ to protesters being detained.”

Even when bailed, there are sometimes ludicrous conditions that amount to house arrest, “along with a hefty bond and vague conditions that limit their freedom of expression and movement.” For example, Arnon “is prohibited by court order from encouraging others to protest and is not allowed to share posts on social media about demonstrations.”

Activist Chonthicha Jaengrew said “these conditions forced people into self-censorship, as ‘even voicing opinions in good faith could put us at risk of our bail being revoked’.”

Chonthicha said such “bail conditions had blunted the protest movement.” As she explained: “We don’t know when these conditions will be used as a tool to revoke our bail, which forces us to be more careful [in our speeches and actions]…”.

Several activists have fled Thailand.

But it is not all a gloomy story. Clearly, the discussion of the monarchy is now more widespread, and activists know that there has been a groundswell of broad support. Arnon thinls “more politicians in the future would be emboldened to question the Thai monarchy.” As he observes: “Discussing the monarchy has caught on…. We might not see a radical change like a revolution … but one thing is for sure: Thai society will not backtrack.”

Corrupt and powerful IV

Yesterday, PPT’s post finished by linking to Rangsiman Rome’s comments on people in the police holding paid but non-existent positions. We added that we didn’t think this was confined to the cops. We said think the armed forces and the bureaucracy as well. And we asked who is pocketing the billions?

And, as we mentioned in that post, the Bangkok Post is taking a particular interest in the unfolding story. Today, the Post has more to say in an Editorial:

The phenomenon of “ghost recruitment” has cast a long shadow over how the government spends tax money to recruit staff to work in restive southernmost provinces.

The government cannot and must not treat this shameful phenomenon as just more of the same bureaucratic corruption. To prevent the scandal becoming a crisis, a fair and reliable probe must be launched to clear the air about recruitment practices at the Internal Security Operations Command (Isoc) — a pillar of our national security apparatus in the deep South….

We doubt that many will consider the Cold War era organization a “pillar” of anything much at all. It has been a semi-secret parallel administration that operates for the military. The secrecy associated with it and the more or less unbridled power it wields are the attributes that make it corrupt. It’s role as the military’s Gestapo means that its power and influence has penetrated all aspects of Thai politics as it works to maintain the royalist regime. To do that, its leaders are allowed to harvest the corruption crop. Just think how much loot is harvested when ISOC has 50,000 personnel – well, let’s say funded positions – in the deep south alone!

We can but wonder why the Post thinks “Isoc has handled some vital and risky missions with expertise and deserves its budget and resources.”

Monarchy propaganda as fake news

The Bangkok Post has published palace propaganda. We know they have little choice in the matter, but we also guess the tycoons who run the paper also love this kind of fake news.

As we write this post, the story has become inaccessible. It remains a searchable story at the Post, and might come back, but there’s also an excerpt here.

With King Vajiralongkorn turning 70 later this year, the military is busy not just crushing opposition to the monarch and regime, but is promoting him and link between monarchy and military.

Reminiscent of elements of then Army commander Gen Apirat Kongsompong’s royalist rant in 2019, the Post article promotes the martial monarch.

It reports that the Royal Thai Army “will upgrade Ban Mak Khaeng Thed Phrakiat Park in Loei,” building a “sculpture of the King, and open[ing] a museum to portray the historical moment when the King, who was Crown Prince at the time, fought alongside troops against communist rebels in Ban Mak Khaeng…”.

Such a propaganda effort promotes monarch, monarchy, military and the bond between monarch and military.

The park was first constructed “by the Internal Security Operations Command (Isoc) of Loei to mark the battlefield in which [Vajiralongkorn]… joined soldiers in fighting Communist Party of Thailand (CPT) insurgents in tambon Kok Sathon of Dan Sai district” in 1976.

As the Post story notes, the “1970s was the height of the Cold War, when communist revolutions toppled governments and monarchies in Laos and Cambodia and when relations between the Thai monarchy and military were reshaped by dramatic and rapid shifts in domestic politics.” The best example of that relationship was the royalist massacre of students on 6 October 1976.

Vajiralongkorn had hurriedly returned from counterinsurgency training in Australia to be there for the massacre and he took up arms with the military to fight the battle against those identified as opponents of the military and monarchy.

The Post reports that: “On Nov 5, 1976, King Rama X, who was [a] … captain at that time, received a direct order from … King Bhumibol Adulyadej … to contain the situation [the anti-CPT fight in Loei].”

A myth in training

Lt Gen Chanvit Attatheerapong, director of the Army Tourism Promotion Agency – who knew there was such a thing – declared: “As a soldier, when the king had fought alongside army troops, it was a moment of incomparable rejoicing for us soldiers. And he [the king] is courageous…”.

It is important to both king and military to create stories of the king-as-soldier in a period when the ruling elite is reliant on  the military-backed regime.

The propaganda is myth-making as “villagers, police and soldiers who witnessed the events tell the magnificent story of the bravery of … the King.” From a soldier taking part in a fire fight, the then crown prince is re-made as a hero:

Pol Lt Suvin Viriyawat, a 69-year-old retired police officer, said the CTP insurgents had nearly managed to surround and cut off a police stronghold….

However, they never thought His Majesty the King would arrive to support his troops. Due to the mountainous area, the chopper could not land, so His Majesty the King suddenly hopped down with his seven royal guards onto the heated battlefield. “His Majesty the King said he was just a soldier, no need to be formal, just carry out our duties. He was so kind to us and ate alongside us too,” said Pol Lt Suvin.

“If His Majesty didn’t show up, around 20 survivors of the 48 might not be alive as we were surrounded with limited supplies for eight days. It was like we were drowning and His Majesty pulled us up. We survived because of him,” he said.

With such embellished stories, ISOC and the Army want to display the martial king, the brave soldiers and the people as one. Such propaganda is believed to be critical for the maintenance of the ruling elite. And, it blots out the critical role played by royals and royalists in the murder of civilians.

Further updated: “The end of Thailand as an open society”

Referring to the regime’s efforts to control and delete NGOs it despises for their independent political line, a Bangkok Post editorial states the obvious: “NGOs in society might be entering a dark age.”

It observes:

The government is jumping on the bandwagon of nationalist governments, like the one in China, or those increasingly looking inward, like India’s, to tighten monitoring of foreign NGOs….

Like it or not, the anti-NGO sentiment might signal the end of Thailand as an open society, too….

So far, society has tolerated NGOs. Even if some of their campaigns touch on politically sensitive issues, the government has never expelled any NGO.

Yet the bill — which is to be tabled in parliament for its final reading soon — will become a game-changer that turns Bangkok into a second Beijing…. If passed, it will give the authorities the power to further audit and regulate NGOs.

Under military and military-backed regimes, political space has always been limited and controlled. In general terms, these regimes – including the current despots – have concentrated on locals identified as enemies of regime, status quo and monarchy. At times this has let to massive bloodletting in order to maintain the status quo of the Cold War and post-Cold War eras.

As the (usually hopeless) National Human Rights Commission points out, this backward-facing regime has made the so-called justice system a political weapon. The NHRC reports that “violations of people’s rights in the judicial process were the most common form of complaints lodged with the … NHRC … last year.” It added that the “complaints concerned the Royal Thai Police, the Department of Corrections and the Internal Security Operations Command (Isoc).”

We are unsure how the military-political agency ISOC fits into to a justice system. But this is the military’s and royalists’ Thailand.

On the ground, repression continues unabated, mostly in the name of the keystone of the ruling class, the monarchy. A recent example is the police raid on one of the truly independent publishing outfits in the country, Same Sky, publisher of Fa Diaw Kan.

Some 30 police – yes, 30 – “raided the Same Sky publishing house on Thursday, but failed to find a book deemed a threat to national security.”

They mean the monarchy.

The police were desperate to find a book “Sathaban Phra Maha Kasat and Sangkhom Thai” (The Monarchy and Thai Society). The “book contains the speech human rights lawyer Arnon Nampa delivered at a rally at the Democracy Monument on Aug 3, 2020 calling for reform of the [monarchy].”

Yes, that’s a book the authorities fear is somehow threatening to bring down the whole ruling class and its state. All very Nazi-like, or borrowing from the Post above, rather more like the Chinese Party-State versus the independent media in Hong Kong.

The hordes of brown-shirted cops “did seize mobile phones and editor Thanapol Eawsakul’s computer, to search for incriminating evidence.” Maybe they’ll just put this evidence on his machines, as they have been known to do in the recent past.

Same Sky stated: “The publishing house does not distribute the book…”. But Same Sky is popular among those who oppose the military-backed regime and has a history of critical and well-researched analysis of the monarchy.

Add this to recent efforts to further constrain the already cowed media and Thailand’s future looks like a dark age, and not just for NGOs.

Update 1: This post marks PPT’s 13th Anniversary. It is not an anniversary to celebrate. Things are getting worse and there are more political prisoners than when we began this blog. PPT remains dedicated to those who are held in Thailand’s prisons, charged with political crimes.

Update 2: Prachatai has posted on the raid targeting Same Sky and Thanapol Eawsakul. PPT has posted the English version of the book the police want here.

More 112 charges urged II

A pattern has emerged. In our last post, we noted that national police chief Pol Gen Suwat Jangyodsuk had urged police superintendents to give even more attention to “national security” cases involving lese majeste and sedition.

Yesterday, Prime Minister Gen Prayuth Chan-ocha, Deputy Prime Minister Gen Prawit Wongsuwan, Interior Minister Gen Anupong Paojinda, and the leaders of the armed forces came together for an ISOC meeting “that was held to sum up its performance over the past year and to announce its action plan for 2022.”

Three army generals in 2019. Clipped from the Bangkok Post

The Internal Security Operations Command has arguably been the most critical agency collecting intelligence on the regime’s and the monarchy’s opponents. It has a nationwide organization that mirrors the civil bureaucracy. It also arranges “fake news,” including “plots” against the monarchy and builds royalist “movements” to face down “threats” from regime opponents.

It is reported that Gen Prayuth “laid down polices for the command to focus more on regional security and tackle threats to national security.” Those latter words are the code for the monarchy.

Bizarrely, Gen Prayuth described this most politicized of agencies as “not a political unit but a body supporting other agencies’ efforts to solve problems besetting the country.”

ISOC’s political role was further emphasized when Gen Prayuth urged “… Isoc and the interior minister to work together closely to address problems through democratic means, adding that dated laws and regulations should be amended to boost efficiency.”

They already do, but little of what they do can be realistically described as “democratic,” except in regime doublespeak.

The pattern being set is a division of roles, with the military and ISOC working on intelligence, using “counterinsurgency” techniques to control the provinces, while the police crack heads and wage lawfare, arresting protesters while the courts lock them up

Investigating disappearances

Protesters have kept a focus on two disappearances: people and monuments.On the latter, we assume many readers will have seen Prachatai’s excellent report on its efforts to uncover the truth about the disappearance of the Constitution Defense Monument.

The story begins:

The approximately 4-metre-tall concrete monument located near the Lak Si roundabout disappeared without trace on 28 Dec 2018, even though it was situated in front of Bangkhen Police Station. However, no one has been able to answer – how did the monument disappear even when 5 months earlier it had been registered as a National Historic Site in the Royal Gazette?

The monument lauded those who lost their lives defeating the 1933 royalist rebellion led by Prince Boworadet and defending the People’s Party and its constitution.

Prachatai has used the Official Information Act to seek information from several government agencies. These efforts produced fake claims that no one in any of the agencies contacted knew anything about the removal of a very large monument of great historical importance. It is as if each of the agencies and their senior bureaucrats have had selective amnesia.

Of course, the reason for official amnesia is that the removal was probably done by the military on orders (or presumption of favorable response) from the palace and King Vajiralongkorn.

As with the disappeared, murdered, and presumed murdered activists in neighboring countries, it seems that the dull leadership of the regime, including the dullards of the military and the slow minds in the palace, believe that disappearing people and monuments that cross the official royalist historical narrative will allow those events and counter-narratives to be forgotten.

Interestingly, “[a]lthough government agencies do not know how and where the Constitution Defence Monument disappeared, there is one group of people that heard news about its relocation and went to watch events from the night of 27 into the morning of 28 Dec 2018.”

Those people know who was responsible for official vandalism:

military personnel and police officers order[ed] that no photos be taken. …[a] plainclothes military officer … claimed to be from ISOC (Internal Security Operations Command). Later, journalists and other people began to enter the area. The officials tried to prevent them from taking any photos or recording any videos. They … delete[d] any photos.

We applaud Prachatai for continuing to remember and for seeking to hold official vandals to account.

Updated: Ultra-royalist cartography

In recent days there has been justified alarm regarding royalist vigilantism mapping the names, addresses and photos of about 500 people, many of them children.

Reuters reports that in this Google-based mapping some of the photos showed students in their university and high school uniforms.

Google has taken “down two Google Maps documents on Monday that had listed the names and addresses of hundreds of Thai activists who were accused by royalists of opposing the monarchy…”. According to Reuters, a spokesperson for Alphabet’s Google said “the issue is now fixed”, adding: “We have clear policies about what’s acceptable for user generated My Maps content. We remove user generated maps that violate our policies.” But these maps had received at least 350,000 views while they were available.

The maps showed the “faces of those named had been covered by black squares with the number 112, in reference to the article under the country’s criminal code [lese majeste] which makes insulting or defaming the monarchy punishable by up to 15 years in prison.”

Rightist vigilante Songklod

Reuters located one ultra-royalist, rightist, activist claiming to be running this vigilante operation. “Retired” army captain Songklod Chuenchoopol said “he and a team of 80 volunteers had created the maps and planned to report everyone named on them to police on accusations of insulting the monarchy.”

Songklod said that he and his team “sought to highlight those they accused of breaking that law.” He said that his “volunteers” hunt “something offensive posted on social media,” and they then log it to the map. He referred to his vigilante work as a “psychological warfare operation,” was meant “to dissuade people from online criticism of the monarchy.”

He described his “operation targeting opponents of the monarchy” as a “massive success.”

Songklod has a history of rightist/royalist activism. He was previously reported as being the “founder of the right-wing ‘Thai Wisdom Guard’ [and] spends most of his day trawling for evidence to file a case under the strict computer crimes act or other laws.” He was said to have then brought a case “against more than 100 people for sharing a post he deemed critical of the Constitutional Court.”

His history suggests that he probably has support from military groups like ISOC, which has a history of supporting rightist/royalist vigilante groups.

These vigilante operations are meant to silence critics through fear of attack and violence, an outcome seen several times in recent years.

Update: A report at Prachatai links Songklod to the so-called Thailand Help Centre for Cyber-bullying Victims. THis seems a reasonable link to rightist, royalist, child abusers.