Troops move against protest holdouts in Bangkok

I / Bangkok May 20, 2010, 13:06 IST

Buildings smoldered across central Bangkok today and troops exchanged sporadic fire with pockets of holdouts a day after the army routed anti-government protesters in a push to end Thailand's deadliest political violence in nearly 20 years.

Although the government quelled most of the violence in the battered Thai capital, it announced that a nighttime curfew had been extended in Bangkok and 23 other provinces for three more days.

"Overall, we have the situation under control," army spokesman Col Sansern Kawekamnerd said.

A major military operation the day before, in which at least seven people were killed and 88 wounded, was largely successful, but underlying political divisions that caused Thailand's crisis may have been exacerbated, and unrest spread to provinces in the north and northeast.

Bangkok's skyline overnight was blotted by flashes of fire and black smoke from more than three dozen buildings set ablaze including Thailand's stock exchange, main power company, banks, a movie theater and one of Asia's largest shopping malls.

The government described the mayhem as "an organised crime. It is terrorism". Sansern, who said 122 police and army units were involved in the operation, said authorities found a cache of explosives and assault rifles during their sweep against the Red Shirts.

Troops in the central business district, occupied by protesters for weeks, exchanged occasional fire today morning with holdouts as locals in the area looted a vast tent city the activists had cobbled together.

A special police unit entered a Buddhist temple inside the former protest site where the government said 5,000 Red Shirt supporters, most of them women, old men and children, had sought shelter in recent days. Associated Press photographers said there was no resistance at the temple as police took away the group to a nearby police station.

Some cried and many were fearful that they would be incarcerated by the military. Others remained defiant.

"We won. We won. The Red Shirts will rise again," shouted one woman.

Since the Red Shirts began their protest in mid-March, at least 75 people mostly civilians have been killed and nearly 1,800 wounded. Of those, 46 people have died in clashes that started May 13 after the army tried to blockade their 1-square-mile (3-square-kilometre) camp.

Six bodies were found at the temple, but it was unclear when those people died and whether they already were included in the official death toll as collected by the government's Erawan Emergency Centre.