By Thai Newsroom Reporters
NO EXECUTIVE DECREE could be issued by the Pheu Thai-led government to extend a 20-year litigation period for 2004’s Tak Bai incident in the Deep South, said Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra today (Oct. 24).
Paetongtarn told reporters at Government House the historic manslaughter of 85 southern protesters, 78 of whom suffocated aboard crammed army trucks on the way from outside Tak Bai police station in Narathiwat to an army barracks in Pattani could not be legally extended beyond its 20-year litigation period which is ending tomorrow to otherwise bring any of a total of 14 criminal suspects to justice.
The woman prime minister expressed her condolences for the tragic incident which occurred in the time of her father/former prime minister/now de facto Pheu Thai boss Thaksin Shinawatra.
She said she had consulted the Council of State which had concluded no executive decree could be issued to extend the litigation period for the authorities to bring to justice those suspects who have apparently remained at large despite being held accountable for the Tak Bai incident.
One of those suspects, former Fourth Army Region commander Pisal Watanawongkhiri, among other former army officers, was believed to have fled the country and recently resigned as Pheu Thai MP elected in party-listed mode last year.
Police today launched a last-ditch effort to track down some of those suspects in the provinces as far from the southernmost scene as in the northernmost Chiang Rai but none of them was found.
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Top and Front Page: Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra. Photos: Naewna
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