Very sadly, last night 16 more people died in Bangkok in yet more clashes between the red shirt anti-government protestors and the army. Additionally, more than 140 people were injured, some critically. At least three foreigners were among those injured.
This entire situation is rapidly becoming a national tragedy for my country - the total death toll from the past two months of political protests, which have pitted civilian protestors against police and army forces in increasingly violent street battles in the capital, now apparently stands at 45 (although this is difficult to accurately confirm due to conflicting sets of information from different official sources), plus at least 1,100 injured. These are shocking statistics by any measure.
The protests started out very peacefully in March, but things quickly changed on April 10th when the first fighting between protestors and security forces took place, resulting in 26 deaths. A week ago there was a glimmer of hope that there would be a peaceful end to the trouble, but that does not look likely now or any time soon, not after last night's terrible events.
See this news article from the Wall Street Journal from earlier today for a full report on what happened:
Protesters battle Thai security forces
(If you wish, you can read all my posts about the recent troubles in Thailand by clicking on the Thai Political Trouble 2010 label below this post - reading from my first post through to this one you will clearly see how things have changed from safe, peaceful protests at the start to the totally different and deadly situation now.)
Saturday, May 15, 2010
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