Protest leaders refuse talks, tell CMPO to disband in one day

BANGKOK, January 27 (TNA) - Thailand's anti-government protest leaders have refused to negotiate with the caretaker administration and called for the caretaker government-run Center for Maintaining Peace and Order (CMPO) to dissolve itself within one day. Suthep Thaugsuban, secretary-general of the anti-government People’s Democratic Reform Committee (PDRC) announced in a joint press conference with other protest leaders, including those of PDRC-aligned groups, on Monday that they would not negotiate with the CMPO on leaving their rally sites, claiming that the CMPO is an illigimate body and its call for protesters to leave their demonstration sites is only its accuse to use force to crack down on the demonstrators. Suthep vowed that PDRC demonstrators at seven main rally sites in Bangkok would assist one another if the CMPO used forces to disperse them. The PDRC core leader also called for CMPO authorities to, instead, dissolve the CMPO within one day, as it failed to maintain order during Sunday's advance voting, leading to a violent clash in the capital's Bang Na area with one protest leader killed and 13 other people injured. The PDRC secretary-general also threatened to lead protesters to seize the CMPO base, located in the compound of the Narcotics Suppression Bureau in Bangkok's Bang Khen area, if the CMPO would not be closed by the dateline. Earlier in the day, Caretaker Labor Minister Police Captain Chalerm Yubamrung, in his capacity as the CMPO Director, warned a tough action against protest leaders unless they reopened government buildings they have laid siege within 72 hours. According to the CMPO chief, if protesters did not leave the seized government offices by the dateline, security officers of a special unit would raid the sites and round up protest leaders on charges of violating the emergency decree and intruding into government buildings.(TNA)