Thailand’s highest-ranking military officer piled pressure on the government yesterday to end political unrest in which two people were killed and hundreds injured last week.
Supreme Commander General Songkitti Jaggabatara, who oversees the army, navy and air force, said he had instructed the government to solve the country’s political crisis, ruling out any immediate military action.
“We have held consultations between the three armed forces. I have told the government to solve the problem,” he told reporters.
“As of now there is no coup, it’s not time for the military to come out,” said Songkitti, whose role is largely ceremonial.
Air Force Chief Marshal Ittaporn Subhawong, however, raised the specter of future military action if the government called for it.
“There must be martial law or a state of emergency declared before the military can come out legally,” Ittaporn said.
“The prime minister, who is also the defense minister, is a former judge ... so I assume that he will know what he should do,” he said.
On Tuesday police fired tear gas on demonstrators who had blockaded parliament to protest a government plan to amend the Constitution, a move they say is aimed at helping former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra.
The People’s Alliance for Democracy claims the government is running the country on behalf of Thaksin, who was toppled in a September 2006 coup.
Army chief General Anupong Paojinda said on Friday that the government must “take responsibility.”
“It must investigate how things went wrong after it issued the order [for police to disperse crowds] and then consult among themselves how to take responsibility,” Anupong told Channel 3 television.
“There are many ways for the government to be responsible in order to help the country move on,” he said.
“To launch a coup at this time will not solve the problem ... except to achieve the primary goal of ... easing the situation, but I don’t think it would solve the whole problem so the army’s stance is no coup,” Anupong said.
‘UNUSUAL EVENT’: The Australian defense minister said that the Chinese navy task group was entitled to be where it was, but Australia would be watching it closely The Australian and New Zealand militaries were monitoring three Chinese warships moving unusually far south along Australia’s east coast on an unknown mission, officials said yesterday. The Australian government a week ago said that the warships had traveled through Southeast Asia and the Coral Sea, and were approaching northeast Australia. Australian Minister for Defence Richard Marles yesterday said that the Chinese ships — the Hengyang naval frigate, the Zunyi cruiser and the Weishanhu replenishment vessel — were “off the east coast of Australia.” Defense officials did not respond to a request for comment on a Financial Times report that the task group from
DEFENSE UPHEAVAL: Trump was also to remove the first woman to lead a military service, as well as the judge advocates general for the army, navy and air force US President Donald Trump on Friday fired the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Air Force General C.Q. Brown, and pushed out five other admirals and generals in an unprecedented shake-up of US military leadership. Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social that he would nominate former lieutenant general Dan “Razin” Caine to succeed Brown, breaking with tradition by pulling someone out of retirement for the first time to become the top military officer. The president would also replace the head of the US Navy, a position held by Admiral Lisa Franchetti, the first woman to lead a military service,
Four decades after they were forced apart, US-raised Adamary Garcia and her birth mother on Saturday fell into each other’s arms at the airport in Santiago, Chile. Without speaking, they embraced tearfully: A rare reunification for one the thousands of Chileans taken from their mothers as babies and given up for adoption abroad. “The worst is over,” Edita Bizama, 64, said as she beheld her daughter for the first time since her birth 41 years ago. Garcia had flown to Santiago with four other women born in Chile and adopted in the US. Reports have estimated there were 20,000 such cases from 1950 to
CONFIDENT ON DEAL: ‘Ukraine wants a seat at the table, but wouldn’t the people of Ukraine have a say? It’s been a long time since an election, the US president said US President Donald Trump on Tuesday criticized Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy and added that he was more confident of a deal to end the war after US-Russia talks. Trump increased pressure on Zelenskiy to hold elections and chided him for complaining about being frozen out of talks in Saudi Arabia. The US president also suggested that he could meet Russian President Vladimir Putin before the end of the month as Washington overhauls its stance toward Russia. “I’m very disappointed, I hear that they’re upset about not having a seat,” Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida when asked about the Ukrainian
RSS