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No Joy In Land Of Smiles

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The Associated Press

Published: December 1, 2008

Updated: 12/01/2008 12:33 am

BANGKOK, Thailand - Government supporters converged on the capital Sunday, to counter protesters who seized control of Bangkok's two airports and forced the prime minister to run the country from afar.

Neither the army nor Thailand's revered king have stepped in to resolve the crisis - or offered the firm backing that Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat needs to resolve the leadership vacuum.

The problem runs deeper than the airport closures, which have stranded up to 100,000 travelers, strangled the key tourism industry and affected plane schedules worldwide. Political violence has added to the sense of a drift bordering on anarchy that pervades the country's administration.

Explosions on Sunday hit the prime minister's compound, which protesters from the People's Alliance for Democracy have held since August, an anti-government television station and a road near the main entrance to the occupied domestic airport.

At least 51 people were injured in the blasts, officials said, and no one has yet claimed responsibility.

PRO-GOVERNMENT

•Thousands of government supporters wearing red shirts, headbands and bandanas joined a Sunday rally against the protest alliance.

•They have adopted red to distinguish themselves from their yellow-garbed rivals, The People's Alliance for Democracy.

•Pro-government supporters resent the alliance because of the alliance's belief that rural voters are not capable of casting ballots.

•Supporters fear the protesters will force the army to intervene and force a coup.

ANTI-GOVERNMENT

•The People's Alliance for Democracy blames the government for Sunday's explosions.

•The alliance wants Somchai to resign, accusing him of being a puppet of ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, the alliance's original target. (Thaksin, who is Somchai's brother-in-law, was deposed in a 2006 military coup and has fled the country to escape corruption charges.)

•Alliance supporters are largely middle-class citizens who say Thailand's electoral system is susceptible to vote-buying and rural citizens are not sophisticated enough to responsibly cast ballots.

•They have proposed discarding the one-man, one-vote system in favor of appointing most legislators.

•The alliance overran Suvarnabhumi airport, the country's main international gateway, Tuesday. They seized the Don Muang domestic airport a day later, severing the capital from all commercial air traffic and daring the government to evict them.

AIRPORT PASSENGERS

•Eighty-eight planes had been parked at Suvarnabhumi since protesters forced operations to cease.

•Eighteen planes left without passengers Sunday so they could resume flying, with more expected.

•Some airlines were using an airport at the U-Tapao naval base, about 90 miles southeast of Bangkok. But authorities there were overwhelmed with hundreds of passengers trying to get their bags scanned through a single X-ray machine.

•The Federation of Thai Industries has estimated the takeover of the airports is costing the country $57 million to $85 million a day.

•Some federation members have suggested they might withhold taxes in protest of the airport takeover.

GOVERNMENT

•The army says it has no plans to oust Somchai
•Somchai declared a state of emergency, but security forces have failed to move on the protesters.

•Distancing himself from the crisis has been revered 80-year-old King Bhumibol Adulyadej, who as a constitutional monarch plays no open role in politics but who has healed social fractures in the past.

•The government denied rumors that Somchai had left the country, saying he was operating out of the northern city of Chiang Mai.

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