Thai Labour Activist Somyot Pruksakasemsuk Finally Released

The former ICEM Projects Coordinator in Thailand, Somyot Pruksakasemsuk, was released last night, 13 June, from a prison at a Thai army base. He had been imprisoned since 24 May, together with academic Suthachai Yimprasert from Chulalongkom University, after the two presented themselves to police after they heard arrest warrants had been issued for them.

Yimprasert was released 5 June from a prison at the Adisorn military base in Saraburi, 115 kilometres north of Bangkok. Both were arrested under the government’s Centre for the Resolution of the Emergency Situation (CRES), a hastily put together decree stemming from May’s political turbulence in Thailand.

The release of Brother Somyot follows a criminal court’s decision rejecting the CRES arrest order. Even after that decision, the government held him for another seven days.

The CRES charges against him were for inflaming public sentiment against the government for holding a news conference on 21 May in which he called for the resignation of Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva. He also edited a newspaper that supported the viewpoints of the Red Shirts in recent political strife.

The ICEM called the charges a serious breach of universal free speech rights.

International human rights groups throughout the world, as well as several Global Union Federations, sent protests to the Thai government over the unfair arrests of Somyot and Suthachai. An online appeal by the Dutch-based Clean Clothes Campaign also generated pressure on the government.