• OPINION

  Finding 'Billy' just the start

  News, Editorial, Published on 04/09/2019

  » Thailand has long been notorious for letting numerous mysterious cases of extrajudicial killings, torture or forced disappearances go unresolved, and harbouring a culture of impunity among the state actors allegedly involved.

• OPINION

  Criminalise state torture

  News, Editorial, Published on 17/04/2019

  » As long as Thailand does not criminalise enforced disappearances and torture committed by state officials, anyone could become a victim of state actors' extrajudicial acts without getting justice -- such as in the case of Karen human rights activist Porlajee "Billy" Rakchongcharoen.

• THAILAND

  Curbing the bully state

  News, King-oua Laohong, Published on 03/03/2019

  » Thailand's first-ever draft law to protect people from being abducted illegally by state officials is making its journey through the National Legislative Assembly.

• OPINION

  Torture law must pass

  News, Editorial, Published on 17/12/2018

  » This week the junta-appointed National Legislative Assembly (NLA) will begin winding up business for the year. On the schedule for Thursday is the reading of a bill that is long overdue. If passed -- and it must -- it will officially bar government and security forces from using torture and enforced disappearance. It is shocking, this far into the 21st century, that a civilised nation has never prohibited these odious practices.

• OPINION

  P-Move 'win' likely another false dawn

  News, Ploenpote Atthakor, Published on 16/05/2018

  » It's that same cycle again. A grassroots protest petitioning the state to pay attention to their grievances, then rounds of negotiation and bargaining after stiff reluctance, a promise or promises by the state, sometimes with a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU). Mostly the protesters, satisfied, agree to return home.

• OPINION

  It's time to end land rights double standards

  News, Sanitsuda Ekachai, Published on 03/05/2018

  » While the judiciary's scandalous housing estate in the sacred forest of Doi Suthep is receiving tacit government support, the military is rounding up community leaders in the North to prevent them from joining street protests in Bangkok to stop violent forest evictions.

• OPINION

  As poor are evicted, the rich get an island

  Sanitsuda Ekachai, Published on 02/08/2017

  » What do you get from fighting for land rights in Thailand? You cannot ask Den Khamlae, 65, a prominent grassroots land rights activist. He mysteriously disappeared in a forest reserve near his rickety home in Chaiyaphum last year.

• THAILAND

  UN demands Thailand drop cases against women activists

  Published on 02/08/2017

  » KUALA LUMPUR - The United Nations urged Thailand on Tuesday to drop criminal cases against female activists who campaign for the rights of their communities, amid concerns they face increasing harassment.

• THAILAND

  Where hope has vanished

  Spectrum, Nanchanok Wongsamuth, Published on 21/08/2016

  » It was the spot where the villagers had found the chequered loincloth of missing land rights activist Den Khamlae a week earlier. Banjong Sanitnit, Den's brother-in-law, stopped at a nearby tree. He lit six incense sticks and poured rice whisky into a clear plastic cup so that it was a quarter full. And then he prayed.

• THAILAND

  Wife seeks NHRC help to find activist

  News, Post Reporters, Published on 12/05/2016

  » The wife of a land rights activist who went missing in a forest in Chaiyaphum's Khon San district last month has sought help from a human rights agency to search for her husband.

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