Covering events from January - December 2003

The government launched a three-month anti-drugs campaign in February, during which 2,245 people were killed, according to police reports. The authorities claimed that the vast majority of deaths were as a result of drug traffickers killing one another, rather than killings by the police. Four people were executed during the year, all by lethal injection, which replaced the firing squad as a method of execution in October. Groups such as land rights activists, people opposing infrastructure projects, tribal people and migrant workers continued to face abuses and were not adequately protected by the government.

Background

The coalition government led by Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra's Thai Rak Thai party launched a three-month anti-drugs campaign from February to April. Police reported that 2,245 people were killed in this context. The campaign's stated intent was to drastically reduce trafficking in methamphetamines, which are reportedly used by almost five per cent of the population. Other government campaigns during the year included attempts to wipe out organized crime, corruption, and illegal weapons.

Government critics, including human rights defenders and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) continued to face threats, covert surveillance, attacks, and other forms of harassment. In May reports emerged that the government had planned to restrict some NGOs from receiving foreign funding, but the plan was dropped.

In October press reports stated that the level of violence against women in the home in Thailand was among the top 10 in the world.

Abuses during the anti-drugs campaign

Almost 42,000 people were placed on government "blacklists" as suspected drug traffickers or users. Many of the 2,245 killings took place after "blacklisted" suspects had left police stations where they had gone either to turn themselves in or to clarify their status. Officials claimed that the vast majority of these deaths were the result of drug traders shooting one another, which the authorities appeared to condone.

  • In February, a husband and wife were shot dead in Petchburi Province on their way back from the local police station after having been summoned by police because of their alleged involvement in drugs.

A Thai National Human Rights Commissioner received repeated anonymous death threats after he publicly criticized the government's conduct of the anti-drugs campaign.

Two government-appointed committees were designated in February to receive complaints about abuses during the campaign, but effective investigations into the killings were not known to have been initiated. In December, during his annual birthday address to the nation, His Majesty the King called on the government to initiate an investigation into the killings of 2,245 people during the "drugs war" earlier in the year. In response, the government stated that 200 people had been arrested for the killings, and it also set up two committees to investigate the murders.

Death penalty

In October lethal injection replaced the firing squad as the method of execution. Four executions took place during the year, all by lethal injection. The number of people under sentence of death had reportedly nearly tripled between January 2001 and December 2003 to nearly 1,000. The majority of those sentenced in recent years had been convicted of drug offences. Sixty-eight men and women under sentence of death had exhausted all legal appeals. A further 905 people on death row had appeals pending at the end of the year.

Rights of rural and tribal people

Land rights activists, rural people opposing infrastructure projects, and tribal people continued to come into conflict with the government about control over their local resources. Hundreds of thousands of tribal people reportedly continued to be denied full Thai citizenship. The government continued to pursue court cases against 26 farmers in Lamphun Province for trespassing, claiming they had illegally occupied vacant land. If convicted, the farmers, who had been arbitrarily detained in 2002, could be prisoners of conscience.

The government also continued to prosecute 20 leaders of the protest against the Thai-Malaysian natural gas pipeline project in Songkla Province. Local fishing communities opposed the offshore pipeline construction on the grounds that it would adversely affect their livelihoods and damage the environment. The 20, charged on six counts including disturbing the peace, were released on bail and awaiting trial at the end of the year. They had been arrested after a December 2002 demonstration was violently suppressed by local police. Other anti-pipeline leaders have received anonymous threats and have been kept under surveillance.

  • Kham Pan Suksai, a farmer and village headman, was shot dead in Chiang Dao District, Chiang Mai Province, in February after a dispute with local forestry officials who were attempting to fell trees in a community forest. A junior forestry employee confessed to the murder, but was later released without charge. No one was known to have been brought to justice for the crime by the end of the year.

Migrant workers, asylum-seekers and refugees

There were frequent reports of violence and harassment against migrant workers.

  • In May, six migrant workers from Myanmar were killed in Tak Province allegedly on the orders of a village headman; the case was still being pursued in the courts at the end of the year.
  • No one had been brought to justice for the murders of more than 20 migrant workers from Myanmar whose bodies were found in a river on the Thai-Myanmar border in February 2002. The case was reportedly not being actively pursued by the government at the end of the year.
  • On at least two occasions during the year migrant workers from Myanmar protesting against the denial of their labour rights were arrested and at least 446 were deported to Myanmar.
  • In June over 400 male and female migrant workers at the King Body Concept Company factory in Tak Province were arrested and deported after they protested at being paid less than half the minimum wage and against very poor working and living conditions.

Refugees from Myanmar continued to arrive in significant numbers and stayed in camps with a population of over 140,000 along the Myanmar border. Refugees from the Shan community, who also continued to enter the country in large numbers, were still denied access to refugee camps. Asylum-seekers outside refugee camps continued to be at risk of arrest and detention for prolonged periods for "illegal immigration".

In June, 11 Myanmar asylum-seekers were arrested during a peaceful demonstration in front of the Myanmar embassy in Bangkok. They remained in detention at the end of the year. In September, 15 asylum-seekers from Myanmar were also arrested in front of the Myanmar embassy and remained in detention at the Special Detention Centre in Bangkok at the end of the year.

Prisoner of conscience

Sok Yoeun, a Cambodian refugee and prisoner of conscience in poor health, continued to be detained and remained at risk of being extradited to Cambodia.

AI country visits

AI delegates visited Thailand in June.

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