New Mandala

Sondhi Limthongkul cannot remain on the defensive. The military wanted him dead. But miraculously he has survived the assassination attempt. He has spoken out on TV and hinted at the identities of those who masterminded the plot…We will have to see whether Abhisit has the guts to take on the top security personnel and replace [...]

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Consider the past week: An ambitious general. An unsavoury, opportunistic political clique. An official mob recruited by the Interior Ministry. A billionaire concession-hunter. Coup rumours. Media controls. Fear-mongering. Intrigue. The desperate grey politics of survival.
- Extracted from Chang Noi, “Red and yellow and shades of grey”, The Nation, 4 May 2009.

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Pasuk Phongpaichit and Chris Baker have sent through a paper they presented at the Siam Society in December 2008.  It deals with the same general set of magical themes as the article by Charles Keyes discussed in this recent New Mandala post.  The text of the Pasuk and Baker presentation, plus a fascinating series of [...]

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Although [Thaksin Shinawatra] has repeatedly claimed his reverence for the King, he has yet to explain why he often invokes His Majesty in the political context. And he offers no shred of evidence to link the Privy Council to the political feud. He is also obligated to explain why he counts as his top lieutenants such convicts [...]

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In today’s The Nation, Pornpimol Kanchanalak has an interesting set of reflections on student politics, Thai politics and academic politics.
She takes aim at what she perceives as a few personal agendas…and clearly doesn’t appreciate the analytical interventions of those she mocks as Western “scholars” (her inverted commas).  I guess she just happens to disagree with [...]

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New Mandala readers who want to read the full text of Abhisit’s speech in Oxford will find it available from the official Government of Thailand website.
Thanks to the always on-the-ball Political Prisoners in Thailand for drawing it to my attention.

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After SOAS, Giles’s second stop of his tour of major UK campuses to deliver his critique of contemporary Thai politics brought him to Oxford, where he now lives in exile with his wife and son. Around 60 people attended his talk, which I chaired, virtually all of them Thai, some sympathisers and some hostile. Before [...]

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The following opinion piece, which I authored, appeared in today’s Sydney Morning Herald.
Rights abuse? You wouldn’t read about it
Harry Nicolaides was herded, shackled, into a Bangkok holding cell on Monday. He was sentenced to three years in prison for the contents of a single paragraph. The Melbourne author’s crime was to write a short passage [...]

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The following is a statement from Associate Professor Giles Ji Ungpakorn, Faculty of Political Science, Chulalongkorn University.
Details of lese majeste charges against Giles Ji Ungpakorn
Today, the police informed me that I have been charged with lese majeste because of 8 paragraphs in Chapter 1 of my book “A Coup for the Rich”. The paragraphs are [...]

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Amata haeng pa prem: chak patiwat 19 kanya thung chutchop “thaksin” (The Eternal Pa Prem: From the September 19 Coup to the End of “Thaksin”) (2008) by Watsana Nanuam (ISBN: 9789743072734). A journalist for the Bangkok Post specializing in military affairs, Watsana has written a compelling account of the power and influence of General Prem, the so-called “invisible hand” [...]

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