Court begins Thaksin hearing

On trial: Thaksin arriving at the Criminal Court in Bangkok. — AFP

FORMER Thai leader Thaksin Shinawatra appeared in a Bangkok court as it began scrutinising evidence in a royal insult case against him, just days after his daughter became the South-East Asian nation’s new prime minister.

Thaksin, accompanied by his lawyers, went into the court clad in a yellow shirt, a colour that symbolises loyalty to the monarchy. His court appearance yesterday came a day after he received a royal amnesty that ended his commuted one-year sentence in corruption cases, allowing him to walk free two weeks earlier than the end of his parole.

The two-time former prime minister, and de facto leader of the ruling Pheu Thai party, was indicted in June by prosecutors under the lese majeste law that protects the royal family from criticism and a cybercrime law.

“There’s not much to it,” Thaksin said to reporters when he arrived at the court. “This case came about shortly after the coup so it’s about the coup-makers using the law to tighten power.”

The charges against Thaksin, 75, stemmed from an interview he gave in Seoul in 2015 in the wake of a coup that dislodged his sister’s government a year earlier. Prosecutors deemed his comments to have breached Article 112 of Thailand’s penal code, which carries a maximum jail term of 15 years for each offence of defaming the monarchy.

Thaksin is out on bail but has been barred from travelling outside the country without the court’s permission.

Paetongtarn Shinawatra, Thaksin’s youngest daughter, on Friday won the parliamentary vote to become Thailand’s new prime minister.

Paetongtarn was picked for the premier post after the country’s Constitutional Court dismissed Srettha Thavisin in an ethics violation case, cutting his time in office to only less than a year.

Thaksin returned to Thailand from a 15-year exile the same day Srettha became the prime minister last year – events seen as part of a deal that the former leader cut with the royalist establishment to help pro-military and conservative parties stay in power after nearly a decade of military-backed rule under a former army chief.

The truce brought an end to the conflict that had shaped Thai politics for the past two decades. But Srettha’s dismissal and the lese majeste persecution against Thaksin have raised fresh questions if the agreement would really hold. — Bloomberg