Thai protesters strike police headquarters with paint, projectiles
19 November, 2020
A large number of demonstrators marched on Thailand's police headquarters in downtown Bangkok on Wednesday (Nov 18) for another moment of protests, after six persons were shot during violent clashes.
The kingdom has been rocked by a few months of protests demanding changes to the constitution, removing Primary Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha - and even changes to the untouchable monarchy.
Protesters - numbering a lot more than 10,000 according to an AFP estimate - packed the Ratchaprasong intersection in the center of Bangkok's looking and professional district, after their leaders vowed to intensify the movement.
After daubing anti-royal slogans on walls and the ground they marched on the heavily-defended national police headquarters - led by a clown and a parade of giant inflatable rubber ducks.
They were accompanied by a Buddhist monk giving the three-fingered salute borrowed from the Hunger Games movies that has become emblematic of the youth-led protest movement.
Some protesters threw glass bottles and paint bombs over the walls of police headquarters, that was barricaded with dumper trucks, concrete blocks and razor wire, while some used water pistols to hurl paint within the compound.
Many had come built with with helmets, goggles and gas masks to safeguard themselves against police actions.
"We will protect our people. We don't need any violence but you will have no compromise until they connect with our requirements," protester Jay, 26, told AFP.
Wednesday's protest came a day after the virtually all violent confrontations since the protest movement commenced in July, as law enforcement employed tear gas and irritant-laced normal water cannon on protesters striving to reach parliament, and activists clashed with royalists.
More than 50 people were injured, 6 of them with gunshot wounds, according to medical officials, though it isn't clear who was accountable for the shooting.
"KEEP FIGHTING"
Primary Minister Prayut has urged protesters to avoid violence, but ruled out introducing another crisis decree - just like the one banning public gatherings greater than four people which spanned weekly in October.
But there is little signal the demonstrators are prepared to back down.
"We should not hesitate - this is merely a transitional moment inside our record," Sirapop Poompuengpoot, another scholar leader, advised the crowd Wednesday.
"People are doing work for us found in parliament and the rest is up to us: Keep fighting."
Tuesday's drama saw protesters plough through police barricades towards parliament to put pressure on MPs debating constitutional reform, prompting the consumption of tear gas and normal water cannon.
A guy wearing monk robes and a gas mask posesses water pistol as he stands up the three-finger salute during an anti-government rally in Bangkok on Nov 18, 2020. (Picture: AFP/Mladen Antonov)
Police say they didn't fire sometimes live rounds or perhaps rubber bullets on Tuesday, and they are investigating who was simply behind the shootings of six people, which happened about 300m from the key protest zone near parliament.
The Thai People Rights Lawyers Association slammed police tactics, saying they were "not relative to international procedure to disperse demonstrations".
CHALLENGE TO MONARCHY
The movements has seen calls from some for reform to the monarchy, and on Wednesday protesters sprayed a huge selection of anti-royal slogans, many of them obscene.
Such scenes were until recently unthinkable in a country where the king and his family are protected by a few of the world's toughest royal defamation laws.
"Tonight is our primary victory. A success for liberty of speech. We are able to discuss everything, and publish anything, even about our king," protester Luke, 29, told AFP.
"I am really happy. I did not really think this will happen in my own country."
King Maha Vajiralongkorn sits at the apex of Thai power, supported by the military and the kingdom's billionaire clans, and the royal family group enjoys support from mainly older conservatives.
Lawmakers have got this week been discussing various proposals for constitutional modification, which mostly exclude any reform to the monarchy.
On Wednesday they decided to start looking at two proposals for a "constitutional drafting assembly", while rejecting extra far-reaching Charges to revise the part of the royals and transformation the cosmetic of the senate.
Riot police officers have emerged at the police headquarters throughout a rally found in Bangkok, Thailand on Nov 18, 2020. (Picture: Reuters/Athit Perawongmetha)
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