Police Charged Over Drug War

[marshbags]

Quoted from the HRW, dated 04-10-2004

Ref url:-

http://www.hrw.org/en/news/2004/10/04/thai...reaches-new-low

Thailand: Anti-Drug Campaign Reaches New Low

More Than 50 Organizations Sign Letter of Protest

October 4, 2004

Letter of Protest to Istituzione Perdonanza Celestiniana

These latest developments mark a new low in Thai drug policy. Thaksin’s approach to drug addiction merits disgust and condemnation, not forgiveness.

Brad Adams, executive director of the Human Rights Watch’s Asia DivisionThai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra’s announcement of a brutal new phase in Thailand’s “war on drugs” raises fears of widespread human rights abuses, Human Rights Watch said today. In an open letter to the committee that recently gave an “International Forgiveness Award” to the prime minister for his government’s treatment of drug users, Human Rights Watch and more than 50 other organizations called on the committee to strip Thaksin of the award.

On Sunday, Thaksin announced a new round of the anti-drug campaign that began in February 2003. Promising “brutal measures” against drug traffickers, Thaksin said, “Drug dealers and traffickers are heartless and wicked. All of them must be sent to meet the guardian of hel_l, so that there will not be any drugs in the country.”

Thaksin’s remarks suggest a revival of last year’s deadly drug crackdown. Between February and May 2003, some 2,275 suspected drug offenders were shot dead in Thailand in apparent extrajudicial executions. The United Nations special rapporteur on extrajudicial executions, Asma Jahangir, expressed “deep concern at reports of more than 100 deaths in Thailand in connection with a crackdown on the drug trade.” During the first phases of the drug crackdown, the country’s homicide rate more than doubled.

“These latest developments mark a new low in Thai drug policy,” said Brad Adams, executive director of the Human Rights Watch’s Asia Division. “Thaksin’s approach to drug addiction merits disgust and condemnation, not forgiveness.”

The use of spine-chilling rhetoric to promote violence against drug suspects has been a hallmark of Thaksin’s drug policy. In January 2003, Thaksin stated, “Because drug traders are ruthless to our children, so being ruthless back to them is not a bad thing.” Wan Muhamad Nor Matha, the interior minister at the time, said of drug traffickers, “They will be put behind bars or even vanish without a trace. Who cares? They are destroying our country.” In August 2003, Thaksin ordered a “shoot to kill” policy against people suspected of smuggling methamphetamines into Thailand from neighboring Burma.

Last month, the Italian Istituzione Perdonanza Celestiniana granted their annual “International Forgiveness Award” to Thaksin in recognition of his government’s treatment of drug users as “patients, not criminals.” The award marked a public relations boon for Thaksin, who has attempted to soften his image by referring to drug users (as opposed to drug traffickers) as “patients” in need of rehabilitation. In 2003, Thailand passed a law defining drug users as “patients” and providing rehabilitation to low-level drug offenders. Thaksin pledged to provide free treatment to 300,000 drug users while disrupting drug trafficking though tough law enforcement measures.

But the facts tell a different story. Throughout the drug war, drug users have reported beatings, arbitrary arrest and prolonged detention at the hands of Royal Thai Police. Some have been forced to sign false confessions stating that they had trafficked methamphetamine tablets. Others have escaped into hiding, or they have dropped out of drug treatment programs in order to avoid arrest or murder. Health experts fear a spike in HIV transmission as a result of injection drug users going underground and sharing blood-contaminated syringes.

Unquote

I would have loved to highlight some disturbing Thaksin observations / qoutes in this article, which is one of many that document Thaksins overseeing and callous participation in this act of evil.

There was over many months during it,s enforcement many news and media references along with evidence from Thaksin himself in the way of boasting at his achievements and his cold blooded lack of caring or showing any compasion what so ever for what unfolded.

So many human beings died and not one of them was ever proven guilty of anything, as for those totally innocent bystanders, they were in his words part and parcel of cleaning the drug trade up.

Neither Thaksin nor, more disturbingly none of his fellow officers and associates gave a dam_n when executing them all.

Least anyone of Thaksins supporters wish to conveniently forget what it was all about, i,d like to post this above chilling observation of reality.

Also to note, that it was carried out to further a dictatorial monsters platform in the international community and his standing NOT as the *&*%*&^&** of which he was eventually proven to be.

marshbags

Edited May 26, 2009 by marshbags

[Journalist]

Neither Thaksin nor, more disturbingly none of his fellow officers and associates gave a dam_n when executing them all.

marshbags

Pure conjecture - and maudlin sentimentalism well after the event.

I didn't see anyone on hunger strike on Sriracha Police station steps at the time and defying the cops to stomp on their farang genitals.

All very easy now to peep over the parapet and get all Auschwittzy about it.

[Old Man River]

The bottom line. If you are going to state your opinions, who can argue? If you are going to make statements as if they are facts, then prove them. I don't see what is so hard about this.

What, specifically, have i not proven?

"A few symolic convictions will change nothing, are political, and obfuscate a system that is of use to many factions of power, including this government and its backers."

Specifically, your statement above, which is what my original comment was based on. If this is an opinion, in part, I would agree. However, personally, I wouldn't make any statements about this government or any other as if it was fact if I couldn't back it up.

[justanothercybertosser]

Specifically, your statement above, which is what my original comment was based on. If this is an opinion, in part, I would agree. However, personally, I wouldn't make any statements about this government or any other as if it was fact if I couldn't back it up.

Well, and i backed my statement up with the same extrajudicial mechanics employed by setting up the Blue Shirts. Which now also Suthep has admitted in his latest interview that he engineered it to a large part.

And that is, as usual, just the tiny tip of an iceberg, one of which we have enough evidence to make such a statement. But anyhow, thanks for partly agreeing.

[spongeman]

Thaksin got stuff done.

What has anybody done since?

Not squat.

Call him what you will, he was effective.

And the scumball druggies knew it.

Well said me ould Texer. Could not agree with you more.

If nothing else Thaksin created a blueprint so future generations could be free of this evil scourge, without the need for costly court battles.

[Plus]

Suthpe said blue shirts was an Interior Ministry project.

How's that "same mechanics" as drug war death spree? And how Democrats are related to those extrajudicial mechanics of six years ago?

I belive this is the connection OMR asked you to clarify - is it just your personal opinioin or you have some facts to back it up.

[justanothercybertosser]

Suthpe said blue shirts was an Interior Ministry project.

How's that "same mechanics" as drug war death spree? And how Democrats are related to those extrajudicial mechanics of six years ago?

I belive this is the connection OMR asked you to clarify - is it just your personal opinioin or you have some facts to back it up.

Simple:

Extrajudicial killings in the drug war: set up by the government without any legal base, killing alleged drugdealers

Blue Shirts: set up by the government without any legal base, wounding several Red Shirt with guns (and most of what Suthep said was trying to justify this the same way how Thaksin has attempted to defend the drug war killings)

Both: extra constitutional tools of violence set up by respective governments without impunity, one as digusting as the other

History of Thailand: these tactics have been employed many times, most famous were village scouts, Kratingdaeng and Navapol, also used in the 3 provinces against insurgents (one of the many infamous militias there are the Ruam Thai, but there are others, darker ones)

Get it? The connection is the strategies employed, circumventing any existing law.

[Texpat]

If anybody ever endevors to do anything meaningful, there will be a political price to pay. There will be naysayers and hand-wringers all along the way.

Thaksin understood this and forged ahead anyway. He actually made a difference. Unfortunately it was heavily highlighted and cast other leaders in an unfavorable light.

Thaksin had a pair -- a shadowy remnant of Thai political leaders past. Nothing so courageous or noble is possible with all the ass-lickers and gasbags in office now.

If Abhisit and the Democrats (funny, that) ever wish to retain power, they best work quickly on dismantling democracy completely (anyone notice the irony?) and transferring power (and votes) strictly to the elite, cause they're fixin' to git their ass spanked again next election.

But they know all this. Ain't coups handy?

Edited May 27, 2009 by Lite Beer
Derogatory Nickname for the Prime Minister Edited. Lite Beer.

[rixalex]

Thaksin had a pair --

You are talking about the legs that enabled him to scurry from justice, right?

[Journalist]

^Well if two wrongs make a right,

Then the extrajudicial liquidation of perceived drug vermin is ok.

[HagenvonTronje]

I believe 800 out of all killed had no relation to drug dealing at all. That's a lot of "collateral damage" in three months. Those who were vermin, didn't deserve to die either, as thousands of their fellow vermin survived just fine.

But I guess it's pointless to argue the value of human lives, innocent or vermin, with some of our posters here. Civilisation apparently hasn't reached all yet.

And where comes that number from, the number of your believes?

It is not all 'collateral damage'. There are unsolved murders, unsolved murders that in the investigation process could be related do drug crime and unsolved murders with no evidence to be drug related.

In addition, there are cases, which where initially just put into the wrong statistic category. Just your daily normal homicides. Domestic violence, robbery and other reasons why people kill each other and incidents that turned deadly. Solved cases, where the culprits have been found. And where it was clear that they are not related to or results of the 'war on drugs'

The number could be come from the 2007 investigation. They found that 878 cases are not related to drug dealing. But this are not the innocent victims, or collateral damage", these cases just belong into another category.

The deaths of the war on drug are the victims of a policy of an approach to fight 'drugs'. Some hard core, zero tolerance approach. I am sure that mass killing was not the intention, and there was no 'kill them all' order. But it went wrong and out of control. Difficult to admit for the authorities that it slipped out of control. And if I look into "the western drug mule got caught at the airport" threads - there is here on TVboard no space left for some liberal thoughts. But prohibition creates mafia business and a big money business, extra judicial. These people don’t play soft games, murder occurs in the underground business.

The moralists in the normal, the clean society run their anti drug propaganda and fights against so called social vices, partly with such 'vermin' arguments.

Hey ho 'hang them high', no second thoughts, no closer look into the case, the judgement - guilty very quickly spoken. Moral and order such high values.

The paranoia and frenzy of the 'war and drugs’, which leads to unnecessary deaths, is partly based on the exactly same mindset some of the Thaksin hunters demonstrate here. There isn't much difference if I call someone the snakehead that needs to be cut off or call other people the vermin.

Shot first, (don’t) ask later. The inhumanity of the 'war on drugs' is one of the main points. Really interested in the 'war on drug' case are they not. Wrong figures, hyperbole and broad-brush indictment for the sake of Thaksin hate propaganda.

It is much too easy and simplifying to see Thaksin as the main evil evil, he is just a product of this society. The same signals of law and order phrase, the government approach to be everybody’s guide, the fight against the so-called social vices is still there, and in all parties. Look at the anti smoking policies, ban of alcohol on special days and so on. There are the democrats not much different from the ex TRT, ex PPP programs. PAD is much stricter. If there had not be Thaksin - under another PM, of an other party, would have brought the same results. and don't forget a birthday speech of 2002.

The 'war on drugs' and the success were praised in Thailand and that was not just government propaganda. Criticism just came from a few human right groups and pothead networks. But in general, the main part of the society had no problems with the war on drugs and those deaths at all. Some people I would consider sane, I heard saying that there was a success. Of course, no victory, drugs are still around, but a significant lower impact on the society that comes with drug misuse. The circumstances, this Asian society that what the people want to government to do and so on. War on drugs' is a misleading misnomer. Many project where run to counter drug use. a more or less open market suddenly got called illegal, bribe the police not so easy anymore, in a new underground underground market the fights for claims started. Eliminate competitor before he kills you or applies for a witness-protection programme. And of course the Thai police forces are no angles and personal connection to crime circles not unlikely

A way out would be a liberal approach, but that would be too difficult to discuss here on the board and tries to explain waste of time. On the other side, it could results in some funny entertaining replies.

[Texpat]

The whole argument over a few hundred innocents killed is nonsense.

1. Doubt it.

2. So what. Like another poster said, you don't make omlettes without cracking a few eggs.

Completely justifiable in my mind.

You turds remind me of the Safety First wingnuts.

If safety was always the first consideration ... precious little would ever get done.

Pull your heads out. There will always be a price in attempts to eliminate illegal drugs. The sooner communities castigate druggies on their own, the less they have to fear when authorities come in.

Reasonable people understand this. Castaway farangs looking for drug havens in faraway lands should understand this. But they won't.

Fortunately for them, it's game on -- since Thaksin was ousted.

Very unfortunate for the rest of us.

Edited May 26, 2009 by Texpat

[rixalex]

The whole argument over a few hundred innocents killed is nonsense.

1. Doubt it.

2. So what. Like another poster said, you don't make omlettes without cracking a few eggs.

Completely justifiable in my mind.

Seeing as it's completely justifiable in your mind, let's hope that you are the next innocent victim paying with your life for the benefit of the country. And when your family come weeping and sobbing, we'll just say "nevermind about him, he's just one little dispensible egg - you'll get over it - we have already". And i hope you'll be looking down (or should that be "up"'?)

[marshbags]

Neither Thaksin nor, more disturbingly none of his fellow officers and associates gave a dam_n when executing them all.

marshbags

Pure conjecture - and maudlin sentimentalism well after the event.

I didn't see anyone on hunger strike on Sriracha Police station steps at the time and defying the cops to stomp on their farang genitals.

All very easy now to peep over the parapet and get all Auschwittzy about it.

IF they had cared a dam_n they would have stopped or at the very least, changed the way they relentlessly pursued the unfortunate victims...........all of them, totally innocent and otherwise and acted according to the laws of the land.

Maudlin sentimentalsm after the event !!!

What a sick individual you are.

Do me a favour and crawl back under where ever you came from and take your disturbing comments and thoughts with you.

marshbags

Edited May 27, 2009 by marshbags

[marshbags]

^Well if two wrongs make a right,

Then the extrajudicial liquidation of perceived drug vermin is ok.

Vermin, you keep calling them.

There is in this world of ours, many unfortunate addicts of different substances ( of which they can all be classed as a drug in some form or another )

Alcohol and tobacco to name the worst and most familiar ones.

Are we to also classify all of them as vile human beings and parasites and pursue them to the disturbing extreme via extrajudical liquidation.

What is needed in all addictive situations is support and re education as indeed others and in particular the above 2 examples, routinely receive 24/7

God forbid that those in " the highest positions of the government and their elected officials " propose such inhumane vendettas on the ones unfortunate enough to have become addicted to what ever other substance they are dependant on.

While i appreciate and accept that this is a thread about the drug war, i hope i will be allowed to offer a possible off topic example of what i consider an unjust and offensive catergorization of those who were actually drug dependant, killed in the alledged cause of eliminating drugs and what it supposedly incorporates.

Selective Executional Killing via Mafiosi type Judgements is a term i like to use when describing this horrific cleansing programme.

There was not and never was there, anything Judicial intended by Thaksin and the so called police enforces of the law, in this case it was never ever even considered in the board room or where ever they created it.

Indeed rather than uphold it and at the same time protect and help those in need of their guidance and assistance, they didn,t give a dam_n about the citizens or the beloved country of Thailand.

If they had given a dam_n, no way would they have gone about enforcing the horrendous and murderous killing spree that took place and that,s a fact.

Even when it became apparent what was taking place, they still didn,t give a dam_n.

IMHO as always of course.

marshbags

Edited May 27, 2009 by marshbags

[Plus]

The whole argument over a few hundred innocents killed is nonsense.

1. Doubt it.

2. So what. Like another poster said, you don't make omlettes without cracking a few eggs.

If killing a few hundred innocents is "so what?" for you, then there's nothing really to talk about.

We usually argue about who is responsible and how to bring them to justuce and how to prevent similar campaigns from happening in the future.

You come from a different angle - there was no crime, so let's leave you with your opinion.

HT, apparently you are right, 800 murders classified as not related to drugs, it doesn't say that they were on the blacklists, so let's leave them.

How about 1,370 killed without a trial, and how about those publicised cases where clearly innocent people who had nothing to do with drugs were killed - like a couple who won the lottery and was put on a blacklist by their neughbours? Or cases were drugs were obviously planted on dead bodies? Those cases are impossible to blame on drug dealers cutting loose ends.

[Journalist]

^Well if two wrongs make a right,

Then the extrajudicial liquidation of perceived drug vermin is ok.

Vermin, you keep calling them.

There is in this world of ours, many unfortunate addicts of different substances ( of which they can all be classed as a drug in some form or another )

Alcohol and tobacco to name the worst and most familiar ones.

Are we to also classify all of them as vile human beings and parasites and pursue them to the disturbing extreme via extrajudical liquidation.

What is needed in all addictive situations is support and re education as indeed others and in particular the above 2 examples, routinely receive 24/7

The vermin are the people who traffic and push the drugs and create the dependency among the addicts.

These outlaws know the implications of their acts, their drug sales, and yet they and the liberals insist on them being punished within the terms of the 'system'.

I am not advocating an extermination of the users. They need to go to rehab pronto.

To borrow the much-overused posting style of bleeding-heart liberal Rixylix...."How would you feel about the pushers, if it was your daughter who died due to an overdose?"

[Plus]

These outlaws know the implications of their acts, their drug sales, and yet they and the liberals insist on them being punished within the terms of the 'system'.

Somehow vast majority of them were punished without killing them.

Blue Shirts: set up by the government without any legal base, wounding several Red Shirt with guns (and most of what Suthep said was trying to justify this the same way how Thaksin has attempted to defend the drug war killings)

Incomparable to death squads during drug war.

[marshbags]

The vermin are the people who traffic and push the drugs and create the dependency among the addicts.

These outlaws know the implications of their acts, their drug sales, and yet they and the liberals insist on them being punished within the terms of the 'system'.

I am not advocating an extermination of the users. They need to go to rehab pronto.

To borrow the much-overused posting style of bleeding-heart liberal Rixylix...."How would you feel about the pushers, if it was your daughter who died due to an overdose?"

Many of the pushers you refer to are addicted users being used and exploited in many cases by the source suppliers / drug pushers / provide finances and the substances to make them dependant and in turn, to be used in the vicious cylcle it all creates.

The ones deserving being legally taken out of the equation are the latter of whom not 1 big time dealer suffered this inhuman extermination or indeed plain simple judicial arrest and incarceration.

marshbags

P.S.

This thread is about the drug war and EJK,s / EKJ,s and not individual thoughts on drug takers.

Edited May 27, 2009 by marshbags

[Journalist]

If killing a few hundred innocents is "so what?" for you, then there's nothing really to talk about.

We usually argue about who is responsible and how to bring them to justice and how to prevent similar campaigns from happening in the future.

Everyone here recalls very well the nonchalance with which you reacted to the developing story of the Rohingyas. Human life wasn't especially precious to you then.

So the above claim is outlandish and inconsistent.

Many of the pushers you refer to are addicted users being used and exploited in many cases by the source suppliers / drug pushers / provide the substances to make them dependant and in turn, to be used.

Oh, the old "I was abused as a child, so i'm now a paedophile" argument.....Sorry. I don't buy that as a mitigant. Hard luck. Don't be a criminal.

Edited May 27, 2009 by Journalist

[Plus]

Rohingya deaths were found to be grossly exaggerated by irresponsible, sensationalist Western media.

In retrospect I feel I was right not give those stories any credibility. Yes, they were beaten and put on barges, but that's about all that happened.

[rixalex]

To borrow the much-overused posting style of bleeding-heart liberal Rixylix...."How would you feel about the pushers, if it was your daughter who died due to an overdose?"

Why would someone who places such a cheap value on life and responds to the question of innocent people getting caught up in the culling with simply, "so what", be asking such a question?

Or are we to undertsand that if it's your own daughter's life on the line, that's an issue - anyone else's daughter is fair game, right?

[Journalist]

To borrow the much-overused posting style of bleeding-heart liberal Rixylix...."How would you feel about the pushers, if it was your daughter who died due to an overdose?"

Why would someone who places such a cheap value on life and responds to the question of innocent people getting caught up in the culling with simply, "so what", be asking such a question?

Or are we to undertsand that if it's your own daughter's life on the line, that's an issue - anyone else's daughter is fair game, right?

I didn't say 'so what' . Tex did

Yes, if my daughter is a drug pusher. Your daughter is a drug user, and Plus's is a Rohingya. Then its mine that has to go overboard...its tough love. I won't have my child hurting another person's kid. I bring my child up that way strictly.

To ask you a Socratic question, .....surely any parent would be active and strive to prevent them slipping into that world, and if they did, then take drastic action to get their kids out of it? The danger signs are there, and holding off till you find them dead with pinmarks in them, (let alone a bullet hole) is useless parenting. Complaining or feeling sorry for oneself as an inactive parent then is too late.

Plus' apparent inconsistencies can be explained far more plausiibly by pointing out that Abhisit was at the steering wheel during the Rohingya incident, whereas his archenemy and bane of every second of his waking life, Thaksin, was in charge for the drug war.

Edited May 27, 2009 by Journalist

[Journalist]

doubling up

Edited May 27, 2009 by Journalist

[rixalex]

I didn't say 'so what' . Tex did

My apologies.

The orientation of my disdain has been redirected towards Texas.

[jayboy]

Yes, they were beaten and put on barges, but that's about all that happened.

Oh well, that's alright then.

[justanothercybertosser]

Blue Shirts: set up by the government without any legal base, wounding several Red Shirt with guns (and most of what Suthep said was trying to justify this the same way how Thaksin has attempted to defend the drug war killings)

Incomparable to death squads during drug war.

Of course they are - Blue Shirts wore blue Shirts, and the death squads wore black, brown and green. Incomparable colors.

[Plus]

Plus' apparent inconsistencies can be explained far more plausiibly by pointing out that Abhisit was..

For two or three weeks I thought it was a non-story at all and I didn't even follow it. I only took interest when I saw outrageous "hundreds eaten by sharks" claims being repeated over and over again.

Maybe you brought it here as a red herring.

>>>

Marshbags is right - many were forced to sell yaba to sustain their own habits.

One of the positive sides was that addiction itself was decriminalised, by Thaksin, of all people, and low level users/dealers were let off the hook completely, after short rehabilitation spell. But now it looks like our own board members argue for killing them all instead.

[Plus]

Blue Shirts wore blue Shirts, and the death squads wore black, brown and green.

And reds wore red and were set up without any legal base by the government to harass PAD, and PAD was setup by elites to harass Thaksin.

Therefore they are all the same as death squads.

There are other striking similarities as well - they all had arms and legs and they were all Thais of adult age.

[justanothercybertosser]

Blue Shirts wore blue Shirts, and the death squads wore black, brown and green.

And reds wore red and were set up without any legal base by the government to harass PAD, and PAD was setup by elites to harass Thaksin.

Therefore they are all the same as death squads.

There are other striking similarities as well - they all had arms and legs and they were all Thais of adult age.

Both Red Shirts and Yellow Shirts are protest movements that have grown into mass movements, and were not set up by any government (but received support by members of the government/opposition).

The Blue Shirts are/were a purely artificial group set up by a government for a particular purpose as state tool. That purpose included using violence that the security agencies were not to use, officially. The death squads during the drug war were set up for a very similar purpose - also to use violence against a perceived enemy - with plausible deniability. Basically, the same mechanics, the same intentions.

The only difference are the number of victims (and i have pointed that out). So far, the Blue Shirts have only wounded several (a few even with guns), and as far as i know have not killed anybody (as Blue Shirts, who knows what they did in different uniforms or color codes). But that doesn't mean much, because it's not over, and the same strategy most likely will be used again (Abhisit was quoted to use "civilians" again for the next ASEAN Summit).

What makes the two very similar is the willingness of all governments here to use extra-constitutional means of violence to combat what they perceive as threats. This is in a long tradition of many larger or smaller incidents over the last decades. As long as this system is not changed, it really doesn't matter who is in government, as this system enables any government to use such strategies.

But of course that is difficult to accept for people who have made the decision to take very strong sides in the present conflict, as their Thailand view consists of the side they support, and what they perceive as their enemy.