Additional 2,000 Dead Foetuses Found At Temple In Bangkok

[Padrino]

Certainly a huge case for safe sex education I would say. But as already blogged, furnaces can't be down for too long (bad for cremation business), so if the backlog now is 1,000 (let's say in a week) begs the question how many of these take place in this country annually? Scary thought but with the bar trade as it is, 5,000 hot bods in Pattaya at any one time - once a month mistake and multiply that by Patpong, Cowboy, Nana, and all the other savoury areas let alone Phuket, Chiang Mai etc., and the numbers may not be so staggering and that is only within the sex trade! What about the hi-so's and giks of the rich???

so there are only two social levels of female that exist in Thailand, prostitutes and those who sleep with rich men behind their wives' backs? There are no women in relationships or marriages with thais or foreigners who may wish to have an abortion, or school, college or uni girls who may require abortions. Your post unintentionally gives an insight into what I can only presume is another expat with a seriously uneducated view of thai women and the country at large. - think before you write, it matters.

[seri thai]

Certainly a huge case for safe sex education I would say. But as already blogged, furnaces can't be down for too long (bad for cremation business), so if the backlog now is 1,000 (let's say in a week) begs the question how many of these take place in this country annually? Scary thought but with the bar trade as it is, 5,000 hot bods in Pattaya at any one time - once a month mistake and multiply that by Patpong, Cowboy, Nana, and all the other savoury areas let alone Phuket, Chiang Mai etc., and the numbers may not be so staggering and that is only within the sex trade! What about the hi-so's and giks of the rich???

so there are only two social levels of female that exist in Thailand, prostitutes and those who sleep with rich men behind their wives' backs? There are no women in relationships or marriages with thais or foreigners who may wish to have an abortion, or school, college or uni girls who may require abortions. Your post unintentionally gives an insight into what I can only presume is another expat with a seriously uneducated view of thai women and the country at large. - think before you write, it matters.

After mulling over my thoughts on this story I finally feel compelled to weigh in for what it's worth.

The dead, tragically, are dead but how did it come about?

The state that offers minimal support for abandoned mothers?

A society that passes the responsibility for child caring onto the elderly, not the parent?

A culture (Thai and Fahrang)where the male considers contraception against child birth to be the responsibility of the woman

A consumer society where sex is entertainment and contraception is used primarily because of personal fear of an STD not responsibility for the potential child?

I'll make some personal observations here. In two marriages I have had two wives who informed me that they could not conceive (one fahrang, and one thai.) I am now the father of one fahrang and one thai son! I have been in the fortunate position of being wealthy enough to care for both. As both were unplanned I offered the mothers the opportunity of an early abortion which they both declined. I am now a proud and happy father of two wonderful sons aged 22 and 4 years.

My second wife has two children by a previous husband who decamped at the prospect of supporting 2 children, a wife and a mistress. So I also have two step-children.

The point here is that my education and upbringing imposed on me the moral duty of social responsibility and my education allowed me a career with sufficient income to meet those responsibilities.

Therefore what is lacking and at the root of the horrors in this thread is the teaching of humanist ethics, consequences and education, not the rule of law or religious ideals (catholic, buddhist or whatever)

I would also add that every male contributor who has indulged in casual sex or prostitution is partly responsible for the problem. Be careful when you stare into the abyss, lest it stare back into you....

Flame away bar-boys, you know who you are

[webfact]

CRIME

Foetus horror widens

By Pongphon Sarnsamak

Nopphadol Srithaweekas

The Nation

Count rises steeply as police inspection uncovers another 1,654 from two morgues; Three celebrities face questioning; immunity likely for undertakers in exchange for more info

The number of dead foetuses yesterday rose to 2,002 after the inspection of two morgues uncovered another 1,654 carcasses.

Police are set to summon the three celebrities named by the former nurse Lanchakorn Janthamanas, when she was arrested on Wednesday, as having aborted their babies with her.

Police have secured detention of Lanchakorn after obtaining a court approval to extend her detention for more questioning. She had no visitors or a bail request submitted by anybody throughout her earlier and current detention.

More temple officials would be questioned over their suspicious link or awareness to the crimes, Nong Khaem police said.

Suchart Phoomee, another undertaker who was involved in disposing the foetuses, yesterday accused Lanchakorn's mother, Sombat Sinothok, of lying when she told the media that she had nothing to do with her daughter's abortion business. Police found a notebook in which Suchart recorded the number of foetuses delivered to him by the two women.

Suchart said Lanchakorn worked as an assistant nurse at a Bangkok hospital before she started operating the abortion clinic. The abortionist's mother got involved in the operation after her daughter was discharged from another hospital from an unspecified position and for unknown reasons. The undertaker apologised for his actions at a reenactment yesterday at the temple. He appeared stressed and depressed during the session.

Suchart and Suthep Chabangbon have not been charged with hiding or disposing of dead bodies yet, because police are reportedly planning to allow them legal immunity in exchange for information about Lanchakorn and other possible abortionists.

Meanwhile, the Department of Health Services Support will scrutinise more than 4,000 private clinics that provide familyplanning schemes and are located near student dormitories and universities across Bangkok.

"The department has been informed of four clinics in Bangkok had provide illegal abortions," the agency's director general Dr Somchai Pinyopornpanich said yesterday.

This crackdown follows the discovery of nearly 300 aborted foetuses on Tuesday at the Phai Ngern Temple on Soi Trokchan 20 in Bangkok's Bang Kho Laem district.

Somchai said the department had questioned a suspect and discovered some clues linked to other illegal abortion clinics.

"We've got some clues from the suspect but he did not give us the name of the clinics. He just told us the areas," he said, adding that the doctors at the private clinics, who had registered with the department and provided illegal abortions, would be imprisoned for five years and fined Bt10,000.

Doctors will be fined Bt 14,000 and sevenyearjail term, if doctor has caused a single death.

Department will also ask the Medical Council of Thailand to give punishment to doctor who undergo illegal abortion and abuse code of conduct.

"Most of illegal abortion had been underwent at private place," Somchai said.

Meanwhile Health Productive Division's director Dr Kittipong Saejeng said the division found that about 60 percent of abortion were women aged under 25yearold and 40 percent of abortion were women aged over 25yearold.

"Most of women with unwanted pregnancy are afraid to consult with their family. So, they made their decision to undergo abortion," he said.

He added the division found that about 11,000 women had underwent abortion at hospital per year and about 150,0000 women to 200,000 women per year went to private places to underwent illegal abortion.

However, he said a draft bill on reproductive health protection, which would help to resolve abortion in teenager problem, will proposed to the cabinet meeting on November 23.

-- The Nation 2010-11-20

[surayu]

I am sure they must to be all from the same woman, all it's needed here once they find her, is a plug.

[GeorgeO]

"that of one million pregnancies in Thailand each year, 80,000 are illegally terminated"

Beats me how anyone knows the real numbers

Absolutely ... using the Black-Scholes (1973) model, my estimation was 78,373..!

[khaowong1]

What is the abbot of this temple saying about all these fetuses found at his temple. Nobody seems to be saying anything about why he allowed this..

[slapout]

The Thai way is to go after the minor players, not those at the top of the pecking order. This is probably the main factor that the fight against all that is immoral in this country comes to naught.

[reason1]

This train is off the track! Simply put there are working Girls who should know better; there are "nice girls and ladies" who have made a mistake (haven't we all! and us Guys have no responsibility do we? We paid the bar fine etc.) and there are a worrisome number of exploited. Education and access should fix some. Making a fuss about it wont help, making clean easy legal abortions available will, however unpalatable the thought maybe to some/many

[Huey]

If ever further case was needed for cheap, legal, anonymous abortion clinics than this is it. For shame on the Thai govt for making abortion illegal, how many women died in undercover clinics one wonders... disgusting. My heart goes out to the women who have to endure this barbaric system.

[animatic]

Police are set to summon the three celebrities named by the former nurse Lanchakorn Janthamanas, when she was arrested on Wednesday, as having aborted their babies with her.

And now they will hang up to dry on lampposts the '3 famous people' to make examples of them, for doing what is obviously so common with the 'unknown people'. Bet they wished they had spent the cash to go to Singapore now. Guess they never figured she'd might someday give them up in a heartbeat if she gets in trouble. No forward thinking here : live in the moment and make merit at the temple and it all goes away.

Edited November 20, 2010 by animatic

[morganl]

I just watched the news coverage. By now I should be used to the graphic closeups in Thailand, and the casual even smiling faces of workers as they went about the task of bagging up bodies. But is there no respect for the dead ?? Allowing random onlookers at the scene was too much for me and I stopped watching. My Thai family, fatalistic as ever, thought it was bad, but were not that bothered. 2,000 foetuses maybe !! Apart from all the issues about abortion, the news coverage of this type of event leaves me speechless. There are some things about Thailand I will not get used to.

Tim..... I could not agree with you more. I watched the news as well last night with my husband. He is Thai. I could not believe my eyes. He wasn't shocked at all, but thought it was a bit too much. (probably because I was freaking out) I still cannot comprehend what the benefit of showing that footage could possibly be. I have lived here for many years and that by far outweighs anything I have ever seen on so many levels. The lack of discussion it provokes freaks me out just as much as the producer who allows it aired. I do not believe in censorship but this was beyond censorship in my opinion. And the main comment from the news anchor that we watched was his disbelief that this could happen in Thailand. That raises so many issues by itself about reality and how in denial some people are. Anyway, being a strong supporter of legal abortion and a woman's right to choose, has little to do with the lack of humanity, I feel I just witnessed.

[cup-O-coffee]

I have watched this thread on and off for the last few days, and daily it gets worse with numbers growing so I finally decided to sit down and write a comment.

Firstly, how on God's earth could anybody hide 2300 fetuses in a temple for as long as they have been there?

Secondly, what possible other state could a fetus be in, than dead?

Good point! Maybe they were already dead when they were inside the mothers.

Maybe the abortions were performed because it is unhealthy to the mother to carry around something that is dead, in your belly, for nine months.

Why is anyone upset about this?

No one gets upset at "2000 Dead Kidneys Found At Temple In Bangkok"

Exploitation?

If the mother has the right to rid herself of a living fetus, and then it is diagnosed as being dead, once outside of the mother's womb, then why shouldn't she have the right to sell here more fully developed fetus of, say, 8 years old, into slavery and at least get a little money for it?

It highlights the utter stupidity of human-kind and their sinister euphemisms, and makes this topic volatile.

Where's Mr. Gore when you need coverage on another Inconvenient Truth?

[mochafan]

From what i hear from radios and discussions almost 100% Thais disagree with abortions.....

yeah.... wait till you get pregnant while still in school or that uni course you are taking ..... then I'll come back to you and ask you again...

legal abortions is only for the rich...

the reason almost 100% of Thais say they disagree with abortions is...in Thailand people(Thais) will say what they think others want to hear....NOT what the real truth is if it makes them look bad. Looking bad is a BIG no no here....from what i've heard it's generally the norm in 'Eastern cultures'.

[animatic]

From what i hear from radios and discussions almost 100% Thais disagree with abortions.....

yeah.... wait till you get pregnant while still in school or that uni course you are taking ..... then I'll come back to you and ask you again...

legal abortions is only for the rich...

the reason almost 100% of Thais say they disagree with abortions is...in Thailand people(Thais) will say what they think others want to hear....NOT what the real truth is if it makes them look bad. Looking bad is a BIG no no here....from what i've heard it's generally the norm in 'Eastern cultures'.

More so, they tend not to disagree with those of higher status, to not make THEM look bad. Higher status, not intelligence. So once a high up says something, then it takes on a life of it's own regardless of logic or charity. It takes someone even higher to contradict them, and then they happily change their tune in an instant, as well as most 'below them'.

I would venture that many politicians make extreme and morally questionable efforts to raise their status, because they simply are not bright enough to get respect for their brains. But greatly desire the ability to dictate, without caring about what they are dictating making any sense. Nor often understanding that it doesn't.

Edited November 20, 2010 by animatic

[cup-O-coffee]

that woman'll be doing some hard time for all those illegal and vile abortions. they lied about how many there were, then the next day they find more! Sad waste of life. even worse when you see in other articles they were children of some hi so who were trying to save their faces.

Respectfully, I chose your post because of the oft used term "Illegal" when used with its compound counterpart "abortion".

If the person performing the abortion does a satisfactory job, and the health of the mother is never compromised, then how could it be illegal?

After all, isn't a fetus simply a non-living organism inside a woman's body, and if she deems it necessary to have it removed, then shouldn't she have the right to have anyone remove it?

If women, who feel they have the right to chose, do so, and use the services of someone who performs this operation satisfactorily, then how can that be illegal?

If a soldier removes an appendix from his comrade in the field of battle, because a medic is not around, then why is that not illegal?

How come people who self mutilate their bodies are not placed in prisons? Its their body, isn't it?

There are too many ignorant and selfish people, who are given too much empowerment over a part of their body that either is, or is not to be considered of no more value than an appendix.

I am simply outlining the stupidity of this ongoing discussion over an issue that is either genocide, or simply removal of an unwanted part of a woman's body that she considers useless, much like cellulite.

I am quite sincere about this.

With that being said, the only horror is that a properly credentialed medical doctor did not perform 2000 removals of unwanted tissue from a woman's body.

So, for those of you who feel the woman has a right to choose, this should be no different than a report on "2000 Appendixes Found At Temple In Bangkok". This tissue just happens to resemble a human being, but the only issue with your kind is that it was not done by a proper medical doctor.

For the people who believe these are human beings, I truly sympathize for these little babies.

Horror at practicing without a license, or horror over exploiting a human life before it reaches the age to decide for itself.

Riding the fence on this one is an impossibility.

On a side note, they shouldn't call it an abortion, they should call it something like a "fetal-dectomy" if it is not alive. To abort means to end something that has begun. To describe what has begun is a four letter word that begins with the letter L and ends with the Letter E.

Edited November 20, 2010 by cup-O-coffee

[canuckamuck]

If the person performing the abortion does a satisfactory job, and the health of the mother is never compromised, then how could it be illegal?

It's illegal because it is against the law, hopefully that is not too hard a concept for you.

I have another question that relates to your post. If someone breaks into a house and stabs a pregnant woman (one who wishes to keep the baby) in the abdomen and kills the unborn baby, is it not murder?

An appendix rarely grows up and raises a family, can you see a difference there?

[housepainter]

The actual story is not where the focus should be. We need to get the gruesome storing of the foetuses out of the way. The fact is that foetuses are being burned along with a mass of other hospital waste, yet such realities seem to shock the public.

OK. Now we're over that let's try to have a mature debate over the abortion law in Thailand. Clearly the law is failing those young women falling pregnant and seeking an abortion. Hence, they resort to back street abortionists. I believe the access to a legal abortion to be too restrictive. This is not helped by the reporting that fails to include incest as grounds for abortion. However, Thailand needs to move towards a right on request for abortion and then the debate can move on to the number of weeks.

Moreover, along with Thailand's poor social infra-structures, lack of support, social welfare, child support, income support, welfare and housing benefits, suppport for one parent families, it seems obvious that anything which helps to reduce this need should be available.

Thailand simply neglects its children yet pretends it values the role of the family in society. There is a woeful inadequacy to apply any law that protects the child and worse, where child rape by a family member is committed, this often remains condoned by society. One argument being that to remove the offender, for example the father, would deny the family a bread winner. A consequence is that it doesn't protect them from their in-house rapist.

Hence, rape and incest results in unwanted pregnancies. Added to this is the Thai male's role as the abandoning father. That is, once the girl friend becomes pregnant he extricates himself from the relationship leaving a single mother to bring up the child. Compounding this further is the failure to understand the use of condoms or apply any form, including abstinance, of birth control.

Wherever one goes in thailand one sees babies. Unfortunately, these are overwhelmingly neglected babies; unwanted by their natural mother, abandoned before birth by the natural father, and left with the grand parents, a sister or worse, a neighbour, to care for. Also, it is not unusual to find children being reared by elderly 'grand parent' type figures, who are childless themselves, but who home these unwanted children and use them as a supply of free slave labour as they themselves grow infirm.

Look again when up country and you see children not in school but turning the rice, planting the fields and reaping the harvest. Child labour.

Having highlighted these unacceptable practices that are on a par with Somalia and the Sudan, Thailand's children clearly deserve more. Until there is the politicfal will to lift the stone and deal with what is underneath, the birth rate should be controlled by whatever means are available.

The back street abortionsists provide a service. They meet the demand in Bangkok. With the sum of ills that prevail and entrap Thai society somewhere between the third world and the medeival, long may the abortionsits continue.

The trumped up outrage being decried by the Press and run with by some posts on here should be weighed carefully against the fact that Thailand's children, and hence it's future, is a neglected, denied, abandoned commodity. In a week this story will have been buried on page 7 and cover no more than a line or two, if it appears at all. Whereas, those pregnant women will not diminish as long as education, let alone sex education, fails to deliver, the Thai male acts without responsibility, women continue to be portayed purely as sex objects, and poverty entraps the overwhelming majority of people. Poverty and ignorance in this case going hand in hand.

Abortion is not the problem but rather part of the solution. A lack of gas and a working burner has put this issue on the front page. Not a single person with a conscience. Now society's ineffectual do-gooders are jumping up and down until the next burning issue [ pun?] takes their fancy. Hence, nothing will change.

Remember that if nothing else.

Edited November 20, 2010 by housepainter

[PlanetX]

everyone wants to tell everyone else what they can and cannot do

and dont dismiss the ritualistic nature of keeping aborted foetsus in a temple

Edited November 20, 2010 by PlanetX

[cup-O-coffee]

If the person performing the abortion does a satisfactory job, and the health of the mother is never compromised, then how could it be illegal?

It's illegal because it is against the law, hopefully that is not too hard a concept for you.

I have another question that relates to your post. If someone breaks into a house and stabs a pregnant woman (one who wishes to keep the baby) in the abdomen and kills the unborn baby, is it not murder?

An appendix rarely grows up and raises a family, can you see a difference there?

canuckamuck, I am with you, but I am simply using the same stupid logic of people who live a double standard, and want to eat their cake, too.

Human life, whether in the womb, out of the womb, or on the verge of going to the next place, is being devalued at a rate that scares me. The world is getting smaller and resources will make this a non-issue in a few more years.

Where it gets ridiculous is reading and listening to people who have a difficult time with reality and simply calling a spade a spade.

[Canexpat]

:jap: Slightly off topic, but relevant nontheless. As one who lives in Canada 3-6 months of the year, and Thailand the rest of the time, I am astounded at the lack of integrity in condoms I have in the past purchased in Thailand. Before I left on my first trip my friend had mentioned to me if I was planning on having sex to bring my own supplies of condoms from Canada. I did not pay much attention to his warning for various reasons. After 4 months in Thailand on my first trip I met a wonderful lady, one thing led to another and we fell in love. The first time I had sex with her the condom broke after about 5 minutes. I replaced it, and 5 minutes later the second one broke. It was at that time that I recalled my friends warning. Need to say we took extra precautions after that. I tried every brand of condom available, and the result was virtually the same. Every third condom on average I used broke. I have been using condoms since I was 16 years old, and in all my time using condoms of North American manufacture, I have had ONE break on me. Need to say on subsequent visits to Thailand, I took along my own supply from North American manufacturers, and have yet to have one of them break.

The quality control and integrity of prophylactics in Thailand leaves a lot to be desired. I find it astounding that a country with one of the highest statistics of AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases allows condoms of such ineffective quality and integrity to be sold as an option for those who wish to practice safe sex. The statistic regarding STD related infection does not surprise me at all after my experience with condoms made and sold in Thailand, nor does the instance of unplannned pregnancies after reading this article.

At the very least Thailand needs to bring in some form of quality control and standard for the production of prophylactics if they are gonna promote them as an option to practicing safe sex.

Also I am with the same woman I met on my first trip to Thailand, and will most likely propose marriage to her this trip if she will have me... :jap:

[EyesWideOpen]

I am a bit confused here....I cannot believe that the temple did not know there were 2000 fetuses stored there. No one seems to want to talk about the 800 pound elephant in the room. Meaning the temple must have been involved in this venture, ie making fetuses into amulets. 

Hence the frantic back peddling by the Wat, and plans for massive merit making ceremonies.......

[MikeyIdea]

Furnaces aren't exactly high-tech to my knowledge. Struggling to understand what could have been wrong with them that couldn't have been repaired in a day or two to explain why they were out of action for the length of time that caused such a massive back-log.

Beggars belief.

No, it's not that at all. There was no back log, they were deliberately not cremated because it would be double sin to do that. Not difficult to predict that there would be thousands more to find, there are probably many more around Thailand (if they're not cremated now because this came out).

The underwriter was interviewed on TV3 while he was moved in shackles. He admitted his sin, admitted that he knew that it was against the law, he accepts what he has done. They were not cremated because that would have been an even worse sin. There is no acceptable excuse but that's the best thing he could do in Thailand and it is the truth too

Edited November 22, 2010 by MikeyIdea

[MikeyIdea]

I am a bit confused here....I cannot believe that the temple did not know there were 2000 fetuses stored there. No one seems to want to talk about the 800 pound elephant in the room. Meaning the temple must have been involved in this venture, ie making fetuses into amulets.

Hence the frantic back peddling by the Wat, and plans for massive merit making ceremonies.......

It is not necessary that they knew, they are stored in a special area of the temple and no Thai in his right mind would go there without having a reason to do so.

[sabaijai]

Thailand Revisits Abortion Laws After Grim Discovery

by ANTHONY KUHN

December 27, 2010

Buddhists pray in front of drinks, food and toys laid out for the spirits of the fetuses.

In Thailand, at Bangkok's Wat Phai Ngern, or Silver Bamboo Temple, lottery ticket vendors line the path to a mortuary where bodies are usually stored for cremation. On a recent day, one of the vendors, Lawan Yutitham, explains that the hot-selling lottery ticket numbers that day are 02, 07 and 27.

Two is for the 2,002 dead fetuses police found in the mortuary on Nov. 16. Seven is for the number on the mortuary door where the fetuses were first discovered, after neighbors complained about a foul odor. And 27 is the date in November when the temple organized a large ceremony to pray for the souls of the aborted babies.

Lawan says that she and many of her customers believe some unseen spiritual force near the mortuary makes those numbers especially lucky.

In front of the mortuary, Buddhists lay out little cartons of milk, fruit and toys, all for the dead fetuses to enjoy in the afterlife.

The discovery of the fetuses has drawn attention to a hidden problem: illegal abortions in Thailand. The scandal contrasts with Thailand's general success, relative to its neighbors, in raising living standards and providing health care and education.

Monk: Discovery Caught Temple Off-Guard

The fact that the fetuses were discovered in a temple was particularly awkward for the Buddhist establishment. More than 95 percent of Thais practice Buddhism, which considers abortion a sin.

"As a special merit-making event for the souls of the 2,002 fetuses, this ceremony has been organized according to the spirit of the four 'sublime attitudes,' " intones senior monk Prarajja Dhammavati at a well-attended ceremony. The attitudes are lovingkindness, compassion, sympathetic joy and equanimity.

There's lots of praying at the ceremony, but also lots of street food vendors and a traditional Thai orchestra. There are several stone statues of plump infants with their eyes closed, which the visitors pat and stroke.

Temple spokesman and monk Somprasong Panyavajiro is handling crowds of inquisitive reporters.

"The temple administration had no knowledge of the fetuses beforehand," he says. "I can assure you that monks here in the temple were never aware of this and it was not the temple's intention or aim for things to happen like this."

The temple's monks knew there was a mortuary at the back, he explains, but they seldom went there. The temple assigned non-monk caregivers to manage the facility.

Crackdown Under Way

Police arrested two intermediaries who said they were paid to take aborted fetuses from illegal abortion clinics and deliver them to the temple's mortuary, where they awaited cremation. Police arrested another woman for running an illegal abortion clinic.

The scandal also has sparked a crackdown on illegal abortion clinics. Thailand has thousands of small private clinics, and Health Ministry official Tares Krasanairawiwong says the government can't police them all. No reliable figures exist on the number of abortions that take place in Thailand, according to Health Ministry officials.

"Just only government agency, we cannot deal with the problem," he says after attending the ceremony. "We cannot inspect all. We urge the people to inspect for us or so and tell us. If there some complaints, we have a lot of teams to inspect, and if illegal, we shut down."

Since the scandal, Tares says ministry officials have inspected 25 clinics around Bangkok but shut down only one. He adds that government agencies, NGOs and citizens must work together to help prevent unwanted pregnancies and illegal abortions.

Mixed Support For Reforming Laws

Many Thais are calling for reform of their country's half-century-old abortion laws. The Thai government bans abortions except when the pregnancy results from rape, jeopardizes the mother's health, or when the fetus is deformed.

Democrat Party lawmaker Satit Pitutacha plans to introduce legislation making it easier to get an abortion. He argues that this will reduce social problems and crime.

"The existing laws do not take into consideration a woman's age, financial status and readiness for motherhood," he says. "The discovery of these fetuses shows that there are a lot of young women in our society who are not prepared to be mothers who want an abortion. I think they should have safe options and alternatives that they can choose of their own free will."

A recent poll by Suan Dusit Rajabhat University of about 1,500 people in and around Bangkok found that 47 percent of respondents saw abortion as an individual right of those who can demonstrate they need to have one. And most supported changing the laws.

Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, however, disagrees. He says Thai abortion laws are adequate and don't need to be amended. And he has the backing of the mainstream Buddhist establishment.

Visitors to Bangkok’s Wat Phai Ngern Buddhist temple touch stone statues of infants during a Nov. 27 ceremony for 2,002 fetuses found in the temple's mortuary. The fetuses were found Nov. 16 and believed to be from illegal abortion clinics.

Source: http://www.npr.org/2010/12/27/131762883/thailand-revisits-abortion-laws-after-grim-discovery

[phetaroi]

Source: http://www.npr.org/2010/12/27/131762883/thailand-revisits-abortion-laws-after-grim-discovery

The article said, "Temple spokesman and monk Somprasong Panyavajiro is handling crowds of inquisitive reporters. 'The temple administration had no knowledge of the fetuses beforehand,' he says. 'I can assure you that monks here in the temple were never aware of this and it was not the temple's intention or aim for things to happen like this.' The temple's monks knew there was a mortuary at the back, he explains, but they seldom went there."

White wash. The temple is where those monks lived, yet, it appears they are saying that they're the only one in whole neighborhood who couldn't smell the rotting fetuses. The monkhood making excuses to sweep this under the rug -- instead of taking some responsibility -- is what I find most distressing about the situation.

[Buchholz]

The assistant undertaker at the temple was sentenced to 20 years in prison today according to the other paper.

[kropotkin]

The assistant undertaker at the temple was sentenced to 20 years in prison today according to the other paper.

And let me guess?

The so called "buddhist" establishment was not sentenced?

What's the difference with the pope and his cronies?

Same story, no not same same. just same.

Institutionalised religion, that is the name of the game.

[kropotkin]

I am a bit confused here....I cannot believe that the temple did not know there were 2000 fetuses stored there. No one seems to want to talk about the 800 pound elephant in the room. Meaning the temple must have been involved in this venture, ie making fetuses into amulets.

Hence the frantic back peddling by the Wat, and plans for massive merit making ceremonies.......

It is not necessary that they knew, they are stored in a special area of the temple and no Thai in his right mind would go there without having a reason to do so.

smell??????

[MikeyIdea]

I am a bit confused here....I cannot believe that the temple did not know there were 2000 fetuses stored there. No one seems to want to talk about the 800 pound elephant in the room. Meaning the temple must have been involved in this venture, ie making fetuses into amulets.

Hence the frantic back peddling by the Wat, and plans for massive merit making ceremonies.......

It is not necessary that they knew, they are stored in a special area of the temple and no Thai in his right mind would go there without having a reason to do so.

smell??????

The funeral are not until 30 days after they died in many cases in Thailand, more than those who smell if that is a problem