Another setback yesterday for free speech, as Colorado car salesman Joe Gordon was sentenced in Bangkok to 2½ years jail for insulting the king of Thailand.
Thailand
Your Say: Daily Mail readers' feedback: Seeing the ocean through the trees in Gunns debate
Crikey readers have their say.
Media briefs: Walkley Awards … breakfast with Piers … Rupert returns to Oz …
A hearty congratulations to those nominated for Walkley awards, journalism’s highest honour, announced at simulcast union-funded drinks last night in Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne. Plus other media news of the day.
Thailand’s new PM and her favourite phrase
Yingluck Shinawatra, Thailand’s first female PM, is staying “on message” and embracing the same line delivered again and again: “everything will be done according to an established procedure…”
An uncertain Thailand hopes for reconciliation
Despite coups, bloodshed and political upheaval, Thai voting behavior has been shown to be remarkably consistent.
Political snippets: A day of shame for the Australian Reserve Bank.
Australia has its first ever prosecution under foreign bribery legislation.
Times are a-Changin’ for Thailand’s ‘institution’
In the lead-up to Thailand’s July 3 national election, which many hope will bring stability to a turbulent period, The Bangkok Post call for calm, defending ‘the institution’ and its role in guarding culture and tradition.
Political snippets: More Bangkok for your polling buck
I know I have regularly criticised those of my peers who slavishly rely on opinion polls published well before the actual polling day to predict election outcomes but, I’m sorry, I cannot resist this one that appeared at the weekend in the Bangkok Post.
Bangkok: land of the ladyboys
Bangkok is known for three things: the steaming heat, incredible shopping and ladyboys. Steffi Chang explains her awe at seeing a ladyboy cabaret with her parents as a child.
The lady with the stall below Thong Lo station
Each morning she is there, her stall set up beneath the stairs of the Thong Lo skytrain station in Thailand, long before the sun is up. Damian Doyle guesses her story.
Thailand prepares for economic rebuild after the violence
Now that Thailand is slowly getting back to something approaching civility, it’s time for an accounting. A lot of unquantifiable damage done to the country’s reputation by the disorder, but we won’t find out until much later in the year if the economic fabric of the economy has been affected.
From the land of smiles to the land of riots
The chaos in Thailand continues, with enormous shopping mall CentralWorld burnt out by protesters overnight. But the violence isn’t entirely surprising to Thais. Foreign Policy examine’s Thailand’s decade of political discontent.
Where’s the King? The monarchy asleep as Thailand burns
With the dust settling on the rubble of the former Red Shirt strongholds in Bangkok, Crikey intern Nicole Eckersley speaks to Professor Damien Kingsbury about the future of Thailand’s democratic process and the role of the monarchy.
Crikey Says: Exit the King
King Berenger the First — the protagonist of Eugene Ionesco’s celebrated farce Exit The King — is solipsistic and belligerent and near death. Thai King Bhumibol Adulyadej is also dying.
Battle in Bangkok: this is a class war
Beyond yellow and red, the bloody battle being fought on the streets of Thailand is fundamentally about rich vs. poor, urban vs. rural, explains Andrew Walker.
Thailand needs its king
As Thailand’s streets grow bloodier by the day, the only person who can bring some stability to the country is its beloved monarch, King Bhumibol Ajulyadej, says HDS Greenway. Will he speak up before it’s too late?
Thailand: where soldiers sing karaoke, joke, and shoot people
The Thai riots are at a critical stage. Yet nobody offers a clear way forward, or a reason why tensions that had been bubbling in the background for years had come to a head now, writes Brett Debritz from Bangkok.
Postcard from a ‘yuppie refugee camp’ in Bangkok
Craig Knowles lives in Bangkok and is sheltering friends in his living room which has become a defacto yuppie refugee camp. He writes to Crikey as the violence in Thailand is becoming dangerously unpredictable.
Thailand on the brink of civil war
The moderate voices in Thailand have disappeared, leaving just the militant forces of the Red Shirts and the government remaining. If the killings continue, will it descend into civil war?
Fear of democracy extracts its price in Bangkok
How did a modern, prosperous, thoroughly Westernised country descend into a spiral of violence and chaos? Because a system in which only “the right people” are allowed to get elected is not democracy.
Thailand wrap: 33 dead, a nation on the brink of outright war
As violence in Bangkok continues into its fifth day, 33 have died and another 239 have been wounded. Crikey intern Matt de Neef wraps the global coverage.
Bangkok riots: another militant Islam battlefront?must read Inside the Thai killing zone
A terrifying tale as journalist and photographer Nick Nostitz reports from the riots in Bangkok, where the army opened fire on the protesters, killing 33 and injuring 239. Be warned, some of the photos are graphic.
