Thaksin supporters rally in northeastern town in Thailand

AFP, BANGKOK

Monday, Mar 09, 2009

Up to 1,500 supporters of ousted Thai prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra gathered in his northeastern stronghold yesterday as part of a protest campaign to topple the government, police and organizers said.

The group known as the “Red Shirts” have vowed to take their movement across the kingdom until they force out new Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, who they accuse of being a puppet of the army.

Police said about 1,500 protesters, all dressed in red, had gathered on the main streets of Khon Kaen, a town in the northeast region where Thaksin drew the bulk of his support with policies targeting the rural poor.

“They are listening to speeches from their leaders. Everything is under control, there is no violence,” said Major General Pattanee Siriwatanee, chief of the provincial Khon Kaen police.

About 900 police officers were patrolling the streets, he said.

Thaksin, who lives in exile abroad to avoid jail, might address the rally by telephone later in the evening to air his views on the economic crisis, protest leader Nattawut Saikuar said.

“We are also preparing people to be ready to gather for later protests in Bangkok,” he said.

The kingdom remains polarized between supporters and detractors of Thaksin, and the deep rift has been playing out on the streets since early last year.

Thaksin was overthrow in a military coup in September 2006, but elections just over a year later brought his allies back to government, angering elements of the army, palace and bureaucracy.

Within months of taking power, the Thaksin-backed People Power Party (PPP) was beset by protests by the royalist People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD), which seized Bangkok’s two airports in late November and early December.

They only gave up their siege when a court dissolved the PPP, opening up a power vacuum which Abhisit’s Democrat Party filled in a parliamentary vote on Dec. 15.