Red-shirt members will commemorate the May 19, 2010 crackdown today on Aksa Road in the Phutthamonthon area instead of Ratchaprasong intersection in central Bangkok as during the past three years.
Red-shirt supporters come together on Utthayan Road as co-leaders prepare to address the crowd. The red shirts oppose any efforts to install an unelected prime minister. Apichart Jinakul
Members of the United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship said events to commemorate the fourth anniversary of the May 19 crackdown on the red-shirt protests will not be held in Bangkok’s business district to avoid creating a pretext for military intervention.
The ceremony will be held on Aksa Road where thousands of red-shirt members have gathered since May 10 in a mass rally to counter attempts by People’s Democratic Reform Committee protesters to pressure the caretaker government to step down.
Apart from moving away from Ratchaprasong intersection, the event will also be held without commemorations for Italian photographer Fabio Polenghi who was shot and killed during the military dispersal of the red-shirt protesters.
The photographer’s younger sister, Elisabetta, who laid flowers in a ceremony to remember the slain journalist over the past three years, died on April 28 from pancreatic cancer.
The Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Thailand, however, is expected to issue a statement in remembrance of Polenghi who had been a familiar face in Thailand for many years. Some Bangkok-based journalists who knew him would post a video of Ms Polenghi talking about her search for the truth behind her brother’s death.
In her quest for justice, Ms Polenghi was involved with families of those killed in the April-May violence and political prisoners.
In May last year, the Southern Bangkok Criminal Court ruled in an inquest that her 48-year-old brother had been struck by a bullet coming from the army’s direction on Ratchadamri Road.
An inquest into the death of Japanese Reuters cameraman Hiroyuki Muramoto, who was shot on April 10, 2010, is expected next month.
Volunteer nurse Kamonked Akhad was shot at Pathum Wanaram temple on the same day Polenghi was killed. Her mother Phayao Akhad said she would hold religious rites for her daughter at the temple in the morning before joining the red-shirt rally on Aksa Road.
“The only thing we want to see is Thailand’s recognition of the International Criminal Court’s jurisprudence so no more people will be killed by the authorities without those responsible being punished,’’ said Ms Phayao.
Ms Phayao and others who lost family members protested against Pheu Thai’s amnesty bill last October.
She said she was disappointed the issue sparked a conflict that led to the political crisis.
“We don’t want to see anyone injured or killed any more. But we don’t want to see those who think differently ignite hatred against each other either. We are all Thais, no matter which colour-coded groups we follow,’’ said Ms Phayao.
She said she would press on with criminal lawsuits against the military and the then Abhisit Vejjajiva government, after a court inquest in August last year which ruled that her daughter was killed by soldiers.
Many other red-shirt sympathisers who stand to attend the May 19, 2010 rallies shared the same feelings of bitterness and dismay that Thailand was going downhill amid the protracted political conflict.
An Interior Ministry civil servant said the commemorations would be bitter because injustice has not been corrected. The poor and struggling businesses were expected to suffer most as the country’s economy looked to be heading for a recession.