Thai prime minister announces November 14 election date

Bangkok - Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva on Monday announced plans to hold a general election on November 14, in a bid to end the country's political crisis, media reports said.

The election date, announced on state-run television, was part of a "roadmap" designed to end the country's deepening political crisis brought on by a seven-week protest calling for a dissolution of parliament, said The Nation online news service.

The United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship (UDD), better known as the red shirts, has been staging a demonstration in Bangkok since March 12 to pressure Abhisit into dissolving parliament and holding new elections.

The increasingly aggressive protests have already led to clashes with authorities that have claimed 27 lives, including six soldiers, and left more than 900 wounded.

Abhisit, leader of the Democrat party, has vowed to clear the red shirts from their main protest site on Ratchaprasong Road, in the heart of Bangkok's chief commercial district, and to restore law and order but has also promised a political solution to the crisis.

The UDD has been calling for the dissolution of parliament within one month. Its response to the November 14 deadline was not immediately known.

The protest, described by observers as the first popular uprising against the Thai establishment since the communist threat of the 1960s and 1970s, has raised issues of class struggle, the country's huge income gap, injustice and the role of the centuries old monarchy.

Abhisit said one of the preconditions for a reconciliation process will be that all parties concerned must join forces to uphold the monarchy, said The Nation.

The government will guarantee a free press and set up an independent body to investigate the confrontation between troops and protesters on April 10th that left 25 people dead and more than 800 wounded.

The social issues raised by the unusual protest, which has seen the heart of Bangkok seized by protesters since April 3, would also be investigated.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/321782,thai-prime-minister-announces-november-14-election-date.html.