In response to the shooting of a group of youths in the south of Thailand on April 9, an army officer has been quoted as saying that the armed militia personnel were justified to fire in self defence. Two young men and two boys died and a number of others were wounded when Village Defence Force volunteers shot at them in Bannang Sata, Yala. Explaining the incident, Colonel Akara Thiprot is reported to have said that the volunteers were right to shoot as the youths had attacked them with “sticks and stones”.
When is the use of guns justified in self defence? The UN Basic Principles on the Use of Force and Firearms by Law Enforcement Officials lay down the internationally-established and accepted norm that as far as possible, non-violent means must be used before shots are fired. Even then, where the use of guns is unavoidable, law-enforcement officers are supposed to exercise restraint in proportion to the seriousness of the offence and respect and preserve human life. This means that shooting in self defence is justified only “against the imminent threat of death or serious injury” or where the person is threatening to cause similar harm to others. The principles stress that, “In any event, intentional lethal use of firearms may only be made when strictly unavoidable in order to protect life.”
The principles also establish a number of other important features in the proper distribution and handling of firearms: in particular that they should be made available only to well-trained and prepared persons who are subjected to regular testing, and that every case of use of such weapons shall be subject to judicial and administrative review and that the commanders of the persons responsible for the shooting also have liability. “Persons affected by the use of force and firearms or their legal representatives,” they add, “Shall have access to an independent process, including a judicial process [for redress]. In the event of the death of such persons, this provision shall apply to their dependants accordingly.”
In functioning law-enforcement systems, these principles are incorporated into practice through detailed training, operations manuals and legal and administrative procedures to minimise incidents and to obtain accountability where people are nonetheless shot.
By contrast, in Thailand even in normal circumstances police and other law-enforcement officers draw and use their firearms freely, under a weak hierarchical structure where the commander is understood to be duty-bound to defend, not discipline, his subordinates. The ease with which the police and gunmen working on their behalf were mobilised in 2004 to kill thousands of alleged drug traffickers with impunity speaks to systemic use and abuse of firearms by law enforcement personnel in Thailand and the manifest inability of the courts or other parts of the criminal justice system to do anything to stop them.
In the exceptionally heated and dangerous conditions in the south, all notions of the use of firearms as a last resort have long been abandoned. While pretending to prefer peace, the interim government under the September 19 military regime has continued with and expanded upon the bloody and mindless practices of its predecessor, sending more troops, more police, and flooding the region with arms that have been placed in the hands of quickly-assembled paramilitaries and manipulated, frightened villagers. The notion of command responsibility, already virtually non-existent throughout the whole of Thailand, is completely absent from the south.
. To say that some teenagers had it coming because they allegedly threw some rocks is to add gross insult to terrible injury. It is also in every respect morally and legally wrong. However, Colonel Akara got one thing right. He was quoted as saying that there would be no legal action against the volunteer militia personnel as they had acted according to the rules of engagement. This much is correct. The rules of engagement, such as they exist under the emergency regulations over the southern provinces in Thailand–which the government has just announced its intention to renew–give all security personnel a free hand to kill, detain, search and destroy with complete impunity.
In response, the Asian Human Rights Commission notes that the UN Basic Principles on the Use of Force and Firearms by Law Enforcement Officials also contain the following two provisions:
“Governments shall ensure that arbitrary or abusive use of force and firearms by law enforcement officials is punished as a criminal offence under their law.
“Exceptional circumstances such as internal political instability or any other public emergency may not be invoked to justify any departure from these basic principles.”
What say the government of Thailand to them?
