BANGKOK — Do something to help Bangkok’s refugee population at an event promoting their music, food and crafts next month.
After being canceled due to an immigration crackdown, theIntercultural Bazaar is set to host international music performances and traditional cooking from five countries – Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Syria, Vietnam and Cambodia.
Traditional crafts including embroidery and cool henna designs inspired by refugees from Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Somalia and Vietnam will available along with handmade product workshops hosted by local brand Chamaliin.
Asylum seekers from several nations will prepare dishes from their homelands for sale at low cost. Expect samosas, pakora and biryani rice from Pakistan alongside Syrian kebab, fatayer, hummus and ma’amoul (date biscuits).
Sri Lankan dishes will include savory nuts, watalappam (cardamom spiced coconut custard) and sweet Laddu balls. Vietnamese Bahn Mi sandwiches, spring rolls and loklak (Khmer beef stew) will also be served.
Admission is free. Money from food and craft sales go to the individuals involved in making them.
The event runs 5pm to 11pm on Feb. 10 at Brownstone Studio. The studio-gallery-cafe is located in Soi Sukhumvit 77 near Soi On Nut 25 and can be reached by motorbike or taxi from BTS On Nut.
In Bangkok alone, there are several thousands of refugees and asylum seekers. They are not allowed to work and risk being detained and sent to immigration detention centers.
In this Sunday Jan. 14, 2018 photo, a Palestinian woman waits to receive food aid at a U.N. warehouse in the Shati refugee camp, Gaza City. From the Gaza Strip to Jordan and Lebanon, millions of Palestinians are bracing for the worst as the Trump administration moves toward cutting funding to the U.N. agency that assists Palestinian refugees across the region. The expected cuts could deliver a painful blow to some of the weakest populations in the Middle East and risk destabilizing the already struggling countries that host displaced Palestinian refugees and their descendants. (AP Photo/ Khalil Hamra)
SHATI REFUGEE CAMP, Gaza Strip — Mahmoud al-Qouqa can’t imagine life without the three sacks of flour, cooking oil and other staples he receives from the United Nations every three months.
Living with 25 relatives in a crowded home in this teeming Gaza Strip slum, the meager rations provided by UNRWA, the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugee families, are the last thing keeping his family afloat in the territory hard hit by years of poverty and conflict. But that could be in danger as the U.S., UNRWA’s biggest donor, threatens to curtail funding.
“It will be like a disaster and no one can predict what the reaction will be,” al-Qouqa said.
Across the Middle East, millions of people who depend on UNRWA are bracing for the worst. The expected cut could also add instability to struggling host countries already coping with spillover from other regional crises.
UNRWA was established in the wake of the 1948 Mideast war surrounding Israel’s creation. An estimated 700,000 Palestinians fled or were forced from their homes in the fighting.
In the absence of a solution for these refugees, the U.N. General Assembly has repeatedly renewed UNRWA’s mandate, the original refugee camps have turned into concrete slums and more than 5 million refugees and their descendants now rely on the agency for services including education, health care and food. The largest populations are in Gaza, the West Bank, Jordan and Lebanon.
Seen by the Palestinians and most of the international community as providing a valuable safety net, UNRWA is viewed far differently by Israel.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accuses the agency of perpetuating the conflict by helping promote an unrealistic dream that these people have the “right of return” to long-lost properties in what is now Israel.
“UNRWA is part of the problem, not part of the solution,” he told foreign journalists last week. Noting that the Palestinians are the only group served by a specific refugee agency, he said UNRWA should be abolished and its responsibilities taken over by the main U.N. refugee agency.
Some in Israel have even tougher criticism, accusing UNRWA of teaching hatred of Israel in its classrooms and tolerating or assisting Hamas militants in Gaza.
Blaming the Palestinians for lack of progress in Mideast peace efforts, President Donald Trump has threatened to cut American assistance to the Palestinians. UNRWA would be the first to be affected.
In this Thursday Jan. 11, 2018 photo, a Palestinian sits outside his house in the Shati refugee camp in Gaza City. From the Gaza Strip to Jordan and Lebanon, millions of Palestinians are bracing for the worst as the Trump administration moves toward cutting funding to the U.N. agency that assists Palestinian refugees across the region. The expected cuts could deliver a painful blow to some of the weakest populations in the Middle East and risk destabilizing the already struggling countries that host displaced Palestinian refugees and their descendants. (AP Photo/ Khalil Hamra)
The U.S. provides about $355 million a year to UNRWA, roughly one-third of its budget.
U.S. officials in Washington said this week the administration is preparing to withhold tens of millions of dollars from the year’s first contribution, cutting a planned $125 million installment by half or perhaps entirely. The decision could come as early as Tuesday.
Matthias Schmale, UNRWA’s director in Gaza, said Washington has not informed the agency of any changes. However, “we are worried because of the statements … in the media and the fact that the money hasn’t arrived yet,” he said.
Schmale dismissed the Israeli criticisms, saying that individuals who spread incitement or aid militants are isolated cases and promptly punished. And he said Netanyahu’s criticism should be directed at the U.N. General Assembly, which sets UNRWA’s mandate, not the agency itself.
In this Thursday Jan. 11, 2018 photo, Palestinian children play in an alley at the Shati refugee camp in Gaza City. From the Gaza Strip to Jordan and Lebanon, millions of Palestinians are bracing for the worst as the Trump administration moves toward cutting funding to the U.N. agency that assists Palestinian refugees across the region. The expected cuts could deliver a painful blow to some of the weakest populations in the Middle East and risk destabilizing the already struggling countries that host displaced Palestinian refugees and their descendants. (AP Photo/ Khalil Hamra)
Any cut in U.S. aid could ripple across the region with potentially unintended consequences.
Gaza may be the most challenging of all of UNRWA’s operating areas. Two-thirds of Gaza’s 2 million people qualify for services, and its role is amplified given the poor state of the economy, which has been hit hard by three wars with Israel and a Israeli-Egyptian blockade since the Hamas militant group seized power over a decade ago. Unemployment is 43 percent and the poverty rate is 38 percent, according to the official Palestinian statistics office.
“Nowhere else are we the biggest service provider for the population of the entire territory,” Schmale said. He said UNRWA provides food assistance to 1 million Gazans, calling it “an expression of collective shame for the international community.”
With more than 12,500 teachers, nurses and other staff, UNRWA is Gaza’s largest non-governmental employer. It is also involved in postwar reconstruction projects.
The dire situation in Gaza is evident inside al-Qouqa’s home, which is so cramped the family has made sleeping spaces with wood boards and fabric. Two male family members are unemployed. Two others are Hamas civil servants and get paid only intermittently by the cash-strapped movement.
At 72, al-Qouqa is worried about his grandchildren. “If UNRWA provides them with bread, they can remain patient. But if it was cut, what will they become? They will become thieves, criminals and a burden on society,” he said. Many believe Hamas, which administers schools and social services in Gaza, will step in to fill the void.
Jordan, a crucial ally in the U.S.-led battle against Islamic militants, is home to the largest number of Palestinian refugees and their descendants — with nearly 2.2 million people eligible for UNRWA services. This has turned the U.N. agency into a major contributor to social welfare services in the country, which also hosts hundreds of thousands of Syrians displaced by war.
In this Sunday Jan. 14, 2018 photo, Palestinian women wait to see a doctor in the UNRWA-run clinic in the Shati refugee camp, Gaza City. From the Gaza Strip to Jordan and Lebanon, millions of Palestinians are bracing for the worst as the Trump administration moves toward cutting funding to the U.N. agency that assists Palestinian refugees across the region. The expected cuts could deliver a painful blow to some of the weakest populations in the Middle East and risk destabilizing the already struggling countries that host displaced Palestinian refugees and their descendants. (AP Photo/ Khalil Hamra)
U.S. aid cuts could heighten the threat of instability in Jordan, which is grappling with a worsening economy hurt by the spillover from conflict in neighboring Syria and Iraq. More than one-third of Jordan’s young people are without jobs, turning them into potential targets for recruitment by extremists.
Most of the Palestinians eligible for UNRWA services in Jordan hold Jordanian citizenship, and some argue that this has ended their refugee status. But most maintain that UNRWA services are vital to propping up an important ally.
UNRWA’s services are also vital in Lebanon, where Palestinians are prohibited from working in skilled professions and owning property.
Lebanon is the least-welcoming Arab country to Palestinian refugees, because it does not want Palestinians to settle and because it does not want the refugees to upset the country’s delicate sectarian balance. Camps in several cities are ringed by concrete barriers and Lebanese security forces use checkpoints to control who enters and leaves. A recent census found 175,000 Palestinian refugees or their descendants living in the country.
The civil war in Syria has made many Palestinians refugees twice over. Some 32,000 Palestinians who were living in Syria fled to Lebanon, according to UNRWA. In Syria, Palestinians enjoyed the right to own property and to work in all professions. They are not entitled to the same in Lebanon.
Balkees Hameed, 33, arrived in 2013 with her husband, two children and in-laws from Damascus, where their apartment was damaged by rocket fire. The family depends on UNRWA assistance to rent a one-bedroom apartment in a ramshackle building in Bourj al-Barajneh, a Beirut camp. Her husband wipes tables at a restaurant outside the camp. Hameed, like all Palestinians, was painfully aware of the rumors coming out of Washington.
“We are already defeated and now they want to oppress us some more?” she asked.
While more than 5 million Syrian refugees worldwide are entitled to assistance from the U.N.’s general refugee relief agency, Palestinians are barred from it under the logic that UNRWA serves them. But UNRWA in Lebanon is chronically underfunded, and the wave of Palestinians arriving from Syria has strained its finances even further.
“What UNRWA provides is not even a quarter of what a Palestinian refugee needs,” said Ramy Mansour, 34, who fled to Lebanon from the Yarmouk refugee camp in Damascus in 2013. “Take everything and return us to our homes. We don’t want any assistance or anything, just return us to our country.”
FILE - In this Sunday, Jan. 27, 2008 file photo, Cranberries lead singer Dolores O'Riordan performs during the European Border Breakers awards, or EBBA awards, in Cannes, southern France. O'Riordan, lead singer of Irish band The Cranberries, has died. She was 46, it was announced on Monday, Jan. 15, 2018. (AP Photo/Bruno Bebert, File)
LONDON — Dolores O’Riordan, whose urgent, powerful voice helped make Irish rock band The Cranberries a global success in the 1990s, died suddenly on Monday at a London hotel. She was 46.
The singer-songwriter’s publicist, Lindsey Holmes, confirmed that O’Riordan died in London, where she was recording.
“No further details are available at this time,” Holmes said, adding that O’Riordan’s family was “devastated” by the news.
Her Cranberries bandmates — Noel Hogan, Mike Hogan and Fergus Lawler — tweeted that O’Riordan “was an extraordinary talent and we feel very privileged to have been part of her life.”
London’s Metropolitan Police force said officers were called just after 9 a.m. Monday to a hotel where a woman in her 40s was found dead. The police force said the death was being treated as “unexplained.”
The Hilton hotel in London’s Park Lane confirmed that a guest had died on the premises.
Ireland’s President Michael D. Higgins said O’Riordan and The Cranberries “had an immense influence on rock and pop music in Ireland and internationally.”
O’Riordan was born on Sept. 6, 1971 in Ballybricken, southwest Ireland. In 1990, she answered an ad from a local band in nearby Limerick city — then called The Cranberry Saw Us — that was looking for a lead singer.
A name change and a confluence of factors turned The Cranberries into international stars. Their guitar-based sound had an alternative-rock edge at a time when grunge was storming the music scene.
The band’s songs — on which O’Riordan was chief lyricist and co-songwriter — had a Celtic-infused tunefulness. And in O’Riordan the group had a charismatic lead singer with a distinctively powerful voice.
Heavy play on MTV for their debut single “Dream” and the singles that followed helped bring the group to the attention of a mass audience.
The Cranberries’ 1993 debut album, “Everybody Else Is Doing It, So Why Can’t We?”, sold millions of copies and produced the hit single “Linger.”
The follow-up, “No Need to Argue,” sold in even greater numbers and contained “Zombie,” a visceral howl against Northern Ireland’s violent Troubles that topped singles charts in several countries.
Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar tweeted Monday that “for anyone who grew up in Ireland in the 1990s, Dolores O’Riordan was the voice of a generation. As the female lead singer of a hugely successful rock band, she blazed a trail and might just have been Limerick’s greatest ever rock star. RIP.”
The band released three more studio albums before splitting up in 2003. O’Riordan released a solo album, “Are You Listening,” in 2007, and another, “No Baggage,” in 2009.
The Cranberries also reunited that year, resulting in the album “Roses” in 2012.
For a time, O’Riordan was one of Ireland’s richest women, but she struggled with both physical and mental health problems.
The Cranberries released the acoustic album “Something Else” in 2017 and had been due to tour Europe and North America. The tour was cut short because O’Riordan was suffering from back problems.
In 2014, O’Riordan was accused of assaulting three police officers and a flight attendant during a flight from New York to Ireland. She pleaded guilty and was fined 6,000 euros ($6,600.)
Medical records given to the court indicated she was mentally ill at the time of the altercation. After her court hearing O’Riordan urged other people suffering mental illness to seek help.
She told London’s Metro newspaper last year that she had been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, and she spoke to the Irish News about her battles with depression.
O’Riordan said depression “is one of the worst things to go through,” but that “I’ve also had a lot of joy in my life, especially with my children.”
“You get ups as well as downs. Sure, isn’t that what life’s all about?” she said.
O’Riordan is survived by her ex-husband, the former Duran Duran tour manager Don Burton, and their three children.
Indonesian security stand near the ruin of a structure inside the Jakarta Stock Exchange tower Monday in Jakarta, Indonesia. Photo: Associated Press
JAKARTA — A mezzanine floor inside the Jakarta Stock Exchange tower collapsed on Monday, injuring nearly 80 people and forcing a chaotic evacuation.
Security camera footage circulated online showed the collapse, with a group of people plunging several meters (feet) to the ground as the structure gave way beneath them.
People fled the building through a lobby strewn with debris. Emergency personnel tended to the injured on the grass and pavement outside the tower.
National police spokesman Setyo Wasisto said most of the injured were college students from Palembang in Sumatra who were visiting the stock exchange as part of a study tour.
Wasisto ruled out terrorism as a cause of the collapse.
“There is no bomb element in the incident,” he said.
Figures released by five hospitals showed 77 people were injured.
A spokeswoman for Jakarta’s Siloam Hospital said it had received more than two dozen victims.
A college student from Palembang said she felt a tremor just before the floor collapsed.
“The structure suddenly collapsed, causing chaos,” the student, identified as Ade, told MetroTV.
She said some of her friends were hit by debris and suffered head wounds and broken bones.
The stock exchange remained open for its afternoon trading session and its general manager, Tito Sulistio, asserted no one had been killed.
“I guarantee that there were no fatalities,” he said. “I helped evacuate the victims to the park and as far as I know, the worst injuries are fractures.”
He said the exchange will pay the students’ medical costs.
Airport official Kanaruj Artt Pornspolt poses in 2017 with a Christmas present for a child identified as Mashia who had been living with her family for three months inside Suvarnabhumi Airport. Photo: Kanaruj Artt Pornspolt / Facebook
SAMUT PRAKAN— A Zimbabwean family of eight who has been living at Suvarnabhumi Airport for three months has not yet been moved into a detention center, immigration police said Monday.
Weeks after the family’s plight came to national attention, officials said the family is still living at the airport despite assertions late last month that they would be moved into the Immigration Detention Center in Bangkok’s Suan Phlu area.
“The family is currently under airport officials’ care at Suvarnabhumi,” Phakphumpipat Sajjaphan, immigration deputy chief said Monday.
Phakphumpipat said there were still plans to incarcerate the family, which includes several young children, but no date had been set. He would not comment on why the family’s move was delayed.
Phakphumpipat also said that the family is being aided by UNHCR officials. The organization has been aware of the family’s status since at least Nov. 14, when it contacted the Foreign Affairs Ministry about their situation in a letter obtained by Khaosod English.
The family of two men, two women and four children had been staying in Thailand when they tried to depart in October for Barcelona. They were denied entry by Spain and returned to Bangkok. The family has refused to be sent back to Zimbabwe, citing fears for their safety.
The family’s plight first went viral in December when airport employee Kanaruj Artt Pornspolt posted a photo of him giving one of the children a Christmas gift.
A Rohingya Muslim girl wears a sweater outside her tent Sunday in the Balukhali refugee camp 50 kilometers from Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh. Photo: Manish Swarup / Associated Press
BANGKOK — A top Myanmar official said Monday that a camp to house Rohingya Muslim and Hindu refugees who return from Bangladesh will be ready by its promised deadline next week.
More than 650,000 ethnic Rohingya Muslims fled to Bangladesh since Myanmar’s military launched a brutal crackdown in August following attacks on police posts by a militant group. Though Myanmar’s army claimed it was a clearance operation against the terrorists, the United Nations, United States and others have said the operations were “ethnic cleansing” to remove the Rohingya from the country.
Myanmar and Bangladesh signed an agreement in November to repatriate Rohingya and set up a working group last month to oversee the repatriation of people who had fled violence in the northern part of Rakhine state in western Myanmar.
Win Myat Aye, the minister of social welfare, relief and resettlement, said Myanmar was hosting a one-day meeting Monday with Bangladesh officials in the capital Naypyitaw to discuss the logistics of how many Rohingya will be allowed into Myanmar and how they will be scrutinized to be placed in the camps.
Officials plan to start the repatriation process from Jan. 23.
“We are planning ahead to be able accept the returnees from next week and we are sure that this will be done on time,” Win Myat Aye said.
The UN refugee agency said it is not involved in the process but is willing to play a “constructive role” in the process if allowed, specifically in registering the refugees and helping determining whether they are returning to Myanmar voluntarily.
“Our involvement in the process and our full access to areas of return in Myanmar can help to build confidence for all concerned, including the refugees,” said Vivian Tan, UNHCR’s senior regional communication officer.
In the November agreement, Myanmar’s civilian government led by Aung San Suu Kyi, pledged to take measures to halt the outflow of Rohingya to Bangladesh and restore normalcy in the region. The U.N and rights groups have urged the Myanmar government to ensure the safe and voluntary return of the Rohingya refugees.
Many have questioned whether Rohingya would return to Myanmar under the current circumstances.
Japan’s foreign minister on a visit to Myanmar last week urged Suu Kyi’s government to guarantee the safe and voluntary return of the refugees.
State-run media in Myanmar reported Monday the 124-acre Hla Po Khaung camp will accommodate about 30,000 people in 625 buildings and that at least 100 buildings are to be completed by the end of the month. It would be the first camp built in the repatriation process.
PATHUM THANI — Should the slain leader of India’s independence movement be offered bottles of red Fanta to appease his spirit of civil disobedience? Probably not, a professor said Monday.
After offerings of Fanta were found in front of the statue of Mahatma Gandhi at the Mahatma Gandhi Institute at Bangkok’s Rangsit University, a professor was left scratching his head at the gesture.
“The university built the Gandhi Institute and a statue of Gandhi to honor him, and suddenly this is placed in front of it. What do they see Gandhi as, I wonder?” Sinchai Chaojaroenrat, a religious studies lecturer at Rangsit University wrote on his Facebookprofile.
Sinchai’s post has garnered some humorous comments from netizens.
“Why didn’t they offer him salt instead? Didn’t he do a long march to protest British salt production?” Facebook user Palsan Ngerndee commented.
No one has stepped forward yet to claim responsibility for so honoring the statue.
The Mahatma Gandhi Institute was established in October, with the Gandhi statue unveiled by Indian ambassador Bhagwant Singh Bishnoi.
According to local animist beliefs, offerings of food – especially red Fanta – appease spirits. In December, aviation authorities asked people not to leave Fanta offerings by the statue of the giant at Suvarnabhumi Airport.
Ambassador Bhagwant Singh Bishnoi inaugurates the Gandhi Institute and its statue in October. Photo: Embassy of India, Bangkok / Facebook
A photo posted in January 218 to the CSI LA Facebook page showing what appeared to be another fine watch worn by Deputy Prime Minister Prawit Wongsuwan in October 2016 when he was under fire for an expensive taxpayer-funded flight to Hawaii. Original image: Independent News Network / CSI LA Facebook
BANGKOK — The anti-corruption chief said Deputy Prime Minister Gen. Prawit Wongsuwan has not explained the provenance of 23 undeclared luxury watches in his possession, over a week after the deadline to do so.
Gen. Watcharapol Prasarnrajkit, chief of the National Anti-Corruption Commission, or NACC, said Monday that Prawit has filed no explanation with his agency, weeks after another high-ranking commission official said they’d already received it.
Watcharapol, who has been criticized for handling the probe due to his close connections to Prawit, also said the commission has no authority to suspend Prawit pending the probe’s outcome. He said the commission would continue its investigation into what has ballooned from a single multi-million baht watch to include upward of 23 luxury watches including makes by Richard Mille, Patek Philippe, Rolex and Audemar Piguet.
Anti-corruption activist Srisuwan Janya said Monday that he was surprised by the news after reading media reports that Prawit had already submitted a letter of clarification. He said it looked like those tasked with investigating Prawit were actually stalling to buy him more time.
“Society can perceive this as a tactic to give Gen. Prawit more time to explain,” Srisuwan said. “Actually I was worried from the beginning that the NACC wasn’t willing to talk so much about the case.”
The activist – who has petitioned the NACC to probe Prawit and urged junta leader Gen. Prayuth Chan-ocha to suspend him from duty – said he will keep an eye on the case’s progress.
In early December, Prawit was spotted wearing a 3 million baht-plus Richard Mille watch in a group photo of the new cabinet. As the scandal unfolded – Prawit did not declare any such item in his mandatory asset disclosures – online sleuths discovered old photos of him wearing various multi-million baht wristwatches. At least 22 more have been spotted to date.
On Dec. 29, NACC Secretary-General Worawit Sukboon said that Prawit had submitted his explanation, but declined to discuss its contents, saying it was a “delicate matter.”
Attempts to reach Worawit on Monday were not immediately successful.
A graphic posted to CSI LA on Friday showing various watches believed seen on the wrist of junta No. 2 Prawit Wongsuwan. Image: CSI LA / Facebook
Security officers detain sex workers and staff at Victoria's Secret massage parlor on Friday
BANGKOK — When officers from the Department of Special Investigation raided a commercial sex venue Friday, they found more than 100 sex workers, some believed to be underage and forced into prostitution.
They also found something else: A ledger that appeared to document visits by officers from a local police station to the brothel – called Victoria’s Secret – for free services. Other pages also allegedly recorded free “food and beverages” for cops from five agencies, local tax office agents and even anti-trafficking officials.
One page listed the “chief of Wang Thong Lang Police Station” as a client who received services worth 2,750 baht on Sept 18. The same “chief” returned there five days later for more, the ledger showed.
Another page recorded that 6,000 baht worth of food and drinks were served to a Bangkok metro police commander.
By Monday, every agency implicated in the ledger had denied involvement, while investigators said they are preoccupied identifying victims of human trafficking among the arrested women. Meanwhile, five senior officers at Wang Thong Lang Police Station were suspended from active duty in the wake of the raid.
“I don’t think it’s real,” deputy station commander Pichai Toontham said, when asked about the records in the ledger. “There’s no such [visits], because police are not allowed to do that.”
Pichai was among the five officers removed from active duty alongside station chief Thammanoon Boonrueng. Col. Thammanoon could not be reached for comment as of press time. Pichai declined to discuss his transfer.
“It is up to the judgement of my supervisor. I’d prefer not to answer that question,” Lt. Col. Pichai said when asked if he believes he was being treated fairly.
A combined force of Department of Special Investigation officers, soldiers and police raided the brothel Friday near Rama IX Road. Officials said they were acting on a tip that underage girls and trafficked women were being forced to work there.
A total of 133 sex workers were taken into custody. The 55-year-old manager, Boonsap Amornrattanasiri, was arrested and charged with human trafficking. Five of his aides are being held for questioning, police said.
Police spokesman Krissana Pattanacharoen said Sunday that none of the workers was proven to be underage so far, while immigration police said Monday that at least 20 people appeared to have been trafficked from neighboring countries Myanmar, Laos and Cambodia.
Victoria’s Secret is among scores of brothels euphemistically called massage parlors that dot Bangkok and are concentrated in its red light districts. Inside, sex workers give clients baths, massages and sexual services.
Baksheesh Files
Critics and anti-human trafficking activists have long accused police of turning blind eye to the flesh parlors in their jurisdictions, or worse, profiting by accepting bribes to turn a blind eye.
Pages from the ledger allegedly discovered at Victoria’s Secret were soon posted online by several Facebook pages, sparking criticism and ridicule of the force.
“It’s so good to be a cop! Free housing, free education for kids, reimbursement if their wives die or their parents get sick, and now fucking for free!” user Sarawoot Saiyapibal wrote in a thread.
The agencies implicated in the alleged ledger were the Wang Thong Lang police, Anti-Human Trafficking Division, Immigration Police, 2nd division of the Crime Suppression Division, Metropolitan Police’s 4th Division and Revenue Department’s 11th District Office.
All of them have either outright denied knowledge or said an investigation is ongoing.
“Our agency is not involved in this in any way,” anti-human trafficking division chief Kornchai Klayklueng said.
“We have examined the information. None of our officials ever used their service,” Revenue Department spokesman Kittipol Singhapol said. “I don’t know the establishment made mention of our name in the book.”
“Our commander has ordered a fact-finding inquiry into this matter,” immigration deputy chief Phakphumpipat Sajjaphan said, also noting that no one was identified by name in the purported ledger.
Col. Arun Vajirasrisukanya, commander of the Crime Suppression Division unit implicated in the ledger, suggested someone could have falsely claimed to represent his force.
“Bangkok is not even our jurisdiction, so there’s no reason we would take care of that area. In short, someone could have made a false claim to be us,” Arun said.
Maj. Gen. Teerapong Wongratpitak, the metro police 4th division commander identified in the ledger as visiting Oct. 2, said he wasn’t even around that day — and he had an alibi to prove it.
Teerapong said he was drinking with his buddies in northern Bangkok till 11pm that night and went home afterward. He suggested that staff at Victoria Secret could have forged the record of his 6,000 baht bill in order to collect the money for themselves.
“I think the cashier and manager were colluding with each other. It could have been embezzlement,” Teerapong said. “I’ve never been there. I never even drank a glass of water there.”
Follow the Money (Until No One is Looking)
Secret ledgers have previously drawn a line between the commercial sex world and cop wallets, and despite solemn vows to get to the bottom of what happened, there was little consequence.
A raid on another flesh parlor in 2016 turned up a similar register that had records of bribes paid to different police agencies.
The implicated officers denied involvement, and police brass pledged an investigation into the alleged bribes, at least until public interest subsided.
Gen. Chalermkiat Srivorakan, a commander of the department in charge of the 2016 investigation, said the chief of Huai Khwang Police Station and his deputy at the time received some form of “disciplinary punishment” for the alleged bribes.
Results of inquiries against other officers implicated in the ledger found at the Nataree have been sent to Public Sector Anti-Corruption Commission Office, but the outcome has yet to finalized, he said.
“No one was fired or suspended,” Chalermkiat said. “Our part of the investigation is over.”
Then-candidate Yingluck Shinawatra strikes a gong on May 27, 2011, in Maha Sarakham province to signal the start of her election campaign in the Isaan region.
BANGKOK — Pundits believe that reliable Pheu Thai votes in Thailand’s northeast won’t easily be swayed by pro-junta elements trying to win their hearts.
A number of political observers and people familiar with the political landscape in the northeast said that despite some defections in other regions, Pheu Thai Party can expect the same strong support from Isaan it has enjoyed in previous elections.
Arat Saen-Ubon, secretary general of the northeast’s largest alliance of nongovernmental organizations, sees voters in the most kingdom’s most populous region as remaining in the party’s column.
“Their old base is solid. They still have their system of networks. Even if there’s a swing [to a pro-junta party], it won’t be critical,” said Arat, who lives in Surin province.
Nonetheless, Arat said, the junta which seized power in 2014 is trying to make inroads through local leaders such as the village headmen, kamnans and district chiefs, who work for the Interior Ministry.
“I don’t think it will swing much though,” Arat said, adding that major policies beneficial to the poor have endeared Pheu Thai in the eyes of voters in the region. If anything, Arat said, wooing canvassers to the military side might have more negative impact on the Pheu Thai and Bhumjaithai parties, two political mainstays in the region.
“I think [a pro-junta party] will have to work harder because in general, people are not impressed by NCPO policies,” he said, referring to the formal name of the junta, the National Council for Peace and Order.
Baramee Chairat, a veteran political activist and grassroots organizer with over two decades of experience working in Isaan, agreed, saying that Pheu Thai just needs to bring the same approach it has in the past.
“If the Pheu Thai Party comes up with similar policies and still competes, I believe people in Isaan will continue to vote for them. It also doesn’t need the old MPs,” Baramee said, referring to speculation some former Pheu Thai MPs may be poached in the junta’s attempt to transition to electoral politics through a proxy party.
In December, leader of a faction of former Pheu Thai MPs led by Somsak Thepsuthin, whose base is in Sukhothai province in the lower northern region, met with Prayuth after Somsak and his men left the party.
That raised doubts about whether Pheu Thai’s continued dominance of electoral politics was as inevitable as many presume. The party and its predecessors have handily won election after election since the turn of the millenium. In the 2011 general election, it won an outright parliamentary majority and put Yingluck Shinawatra in the Government House.
Those doubts last week saw a group of 50 former Pheu Thai MPs from the region travel to party headquarters in Bangkok to reaffirm their fealty – and wish a happy new year to caretaker party leader, police Lt. Gen. Viroj Paoin.
The group, led by former Maha Sarakham representative Prayuth Siripanich, reiterated its allegiance to the party whose de facto leader is fugitive former premier Thaksin Shinawatra. He told party leadership that 100 of its former MPs from the region remain loyal.
Baramee said Isaan people are now more interested in the party’s policies than they are individual MP candidates. He cited policies such as the 30 baht health care program, adding that he hasn’t seen anything comparable come out of the junta camp.
He presumes that’s a factor in the delegation’s recent affirmation.
“I think Isaan people have confidence in the party,” he said. “That’s why the former MPs had to make a show of force.”
Ubon Ratchathani University political scientist Narut Wasinpiyamonkhon believes only the Pheu Thai Party could undermine itself, possibly by making a deal with the junta in return for some benefit to Thaksin or his sister, fugitive former premier Yingluck Shinawatra.
“The issue is not the military party but how serious the Pheu Thai Party will be in facing the challenges. If they crack a deal, the outcome will not be as expected. … So far, Thaksin and Yingluck can’t return. They are still stuck abroad.”
Otherwise, Narut said, northeastern voters will likely continue to vote on the basis of policies they see as beneficial.
