6 May 2010 / REUTERS, BANGKOK
Anti-government protesters refused to leave their fortified camp in central Bangkok on Wednesday, saying the prime minister had to fix a date for dissolving parliament before they would end their two-month-old rally.
The “red shirt” protesters, who had demanded an immediate election, have agreed to enter into a reconciliation process proposed by Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva to end the crisis but take issue with his proposed Nov. 14 poll date. Several thousand “red shirts” remained in the camp in an area of upmarket shopping malls and luxury hotels, many of which have been shut for weeks, at huge cost to the economy. “We will stay until Abhisit tells us the date of dissolution,” said Worawut Vichaidit, one of the leaders of the United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship (UDD). “The government should withdrew all security forces first. Abhisit has no right to set the election date -- that’s the duty of the Election Commission. We don’t know how much we can trust the government,” he told the crowd from a stage. A state of emergency has been in force since April 7 and thousands of troops and riot police surround the encampment, out of sight most of the time or lounging around in small groups. Sirichok Sopha, a member of parliament for Abhisit’s Democrat Party, saw the dissolution date as a non-issue and said the government needed to study the best timing, giving itself scope to pass the budget for the fiscal year from October, for example.
