Thai police to negotiate with anti-gov't protesters

BANGKOK, Nov. 28 Kyodo - Thai police on Friday vowed to negotiate with anti-government protesters
occupying Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi and Dong Muang airports, saying force will
only be used as a last resort.
Metropolitan Police Chief Suchart Muankaew, who was appointed to deal with the
protesters in Don Muang airport, said after meeting with Interior Minister
Kowit Watana that the police will begin by sending a senior police
representative to negotiate with the People's Alliance for Democracy, which is
leading the protests.
In addition, the police will inform protesters at the airports of charges they
face under a state of emergency if they continue their protest.
Suchart insisted he will not use force to disperse the protesters, saying the
country has suffered enough.
''In the event that we have no choice and must disperse them, the operation
will be broadcast live on national television...we do not want to be blamed by
the public for killing innocent people,'' he said.
Meanwhile, a group of government supporters threatened to gather in Bangkok and
stage a counter protest if the police do not take action by midnight Friday.
Thai Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat called an urgent video conference with
high ranking government officials Friday morning in Chiang Mai following his
declaration of the state of emergency around the two airports late Thursday.
Somchai said he wanted provincial governors across the country to tell people
in their provinces to go about their lives as usual despite the state of
emergency.
Somchai has tasked Interior Minister Kowit, a retired police general who once
headed the national police, with directing the operation with assistance from
the armed forces.
The protesters, some of them with children, spent a tense but peaceful night
inside passenger terminals of the airports.
Around 2 a.m., mysterious sounds like shooting were heard outside the passenger
terminal building of Don Muang airport where PAD guards have set up bunkers,
but no casualties were reported.
A television station belonging to a PAD leader was hit by a grenade at 1:50
a.m., police said. One woman working for the station, which has broadcast the
PAD protests around the clock, was slightly injured but no major damage was
reported, they said.
Suvarnabhumi international airport, which closed Tuesday night, has extended
the closure until 6 p.m. Saturday.
But the airport's acting director Serirat Prasutanon said he was trying to
arrange for about 480 people to leave through the airport within Friday,
including some 450 Muslims on a pilgrimage to Mecca who were stranded when it
closed.
The Civil Aviation Department has permitted many airlines to switch to U-Tapao
airport, located in a naval base some 190 kilometers southeast of Bangkok.
The U.N. Children's Fund office in Thailand expressed deep concern over
children with parents participating in the demonstration at Bangkok's airports.
UNICEF also called for PAD leaders and authorities to take all steps to ensure
the children's safety.
The PAD activists, who have occupied Government House in central Bangkok since
August, began their anti-government protests on May 25 and continued even after
then Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej was unseated by the Constitutional Court
in early September.
==Kyodo