The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) is writing to you in your capacity as the Director of Internal Security under the Internal Security Act 2008 to protest in the strongest terms a recent report of the Internal Security Operations Command (ISOC) that human rights defenders in southern Thailand may in fact be militants disguising themselves in order to stir up hatred against government officials, and a raid that followed thereafter on the branch office of a local human rights group.
According to the Bangkok Post in an article entitled “ISOC warns of militant plots” (7 February 2009), the Region 4 command, stationed in the south of Thailand, made a report at a meeting on February 6 to the effect that “southern militants may take the opportunity to disguise themselves as rights activists in order to incite hatred against officials or distort information to create misunderstanding about security operations among locals”.
This report, if the information is correct, amounts to an invitation for the security forces in southern Thailand to target human rights defenders as suspected terrorists. In short, it in effect announces a policy for army, police and other personnel there, who are already operating conditions of almost total impunity, to target human rights organisations, their staff and volunteers.
The AHRC thus sees as no coincidence that the day after the news was published army and police personnel raided the office of the Working Group on Justice for Peace (WGJP), an internationally-known and respected local human rights group working on cases of arbitrary detention, forced disappearance and torture in Thailand. According to the WGJP, around 20 personnel under the command of Lt. Col. Pravej Sudhiprapha arrived in three pick-up trucks early in the morning of February 8 and searched the premises for three hours, going through data in computers and files and interrogating the two volunteers present on the premises.
The WGJP is one of only a handful of groups in Thailand that has systematically documented and reported on abuses in the south of the country in recent years and there can be no doubt that this is a shabby attempt at intimidation on the part of the security forces, in keeping with ISOC’s open invite to target human rights defenders. In fact, such raids have been a routine part of the intimidation and coercion of human rights and legal aid groups in Thailand for many years, but this particular raid is of special concern because of the extraordinary conditions in the south and the expansive powers available to the security forces there above and beyond those in other parts of the country.
Under the Internal Security Act 2008 that was passed through an appointed legislature of the military dictatorship that seized power in Thailand in September 2006, the ISOC is situated within the Office of the Prime Minister and the prime minister has direct command of the agency, its officers and employees (section 5). It therefore falls upon your head to take action when the ISOC is responsible, directly or indirectly, for the making of threats against human rights defenders or otherwise acting contrary to law.
Accordingly, the Asian Human Rights Commission calls upon you to order a special inquiry into (a) the report of the Bangkok Post that the ISOC has taken aim at human rights defenders and agencies in southern Thailand; and, (b) the raid on the office of the WGJP. Furthermore, the AHRC demands that you make an unequivocal public statement to the effect that there will be no attacks or intimidation, physical or otherwise, of human rights defenders working in the south of Thailand, and that any security force personnel found responsible for such acts will face legal action, and issue a notice to this effect to all branches of the security forces in the south for distribution to commanders at all levels.
Although upon taking up the post of prime minister recently you stressed that your government would concentrate on accountability, so far the AHRC, which has monitored your performance closely, has seen nothing of that. In fact, your obfuscations of the armed forces’ repugnant treatment of people arriving in boats from across the Bay of Bengal, the unprecedented new levels of Internet censorship in your country, and the spate of lese majesty cases over trivial allegations all demonstrate that accountability and protection of human rights have plunged to new depths under your government. As for accountability through the rule of law, your obvious unwillingness to take action to bring to court the perpetrators of the outrageous occupation of the prime minister’s compound and airports last year, which resulted not only in massive damage to material infrastructure but was also accompanied by assaults, shootings and killings, demonstrates that the law in Thailand too has been pulled to its lowest point in many years. We urge you to cease playing rhetorical games and get on with the job of addressing the many deep institutional problems that your country faces for the sake of future generations, lest your name simply be added to the list of failed prime ministers in Thailand of recent times.
Please be informed that we will ensure that these matters are also brought to the attention of the forthcoming session of the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva.
Yours sincerely
Basil Fernando
Executive Director
Asian Human Rights Commission, Hong Kong
Cc:
1. Chaowarat Chanweerakul, Minister of Interior, Thailand
2. Professor Saneh Chamarik, Chairperson, National Human Rights Commission, Thailand
3. Margaret Sekaggya, UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Defenders
