2BANGKOK.COM'S NEWS AND VIEWS APRIL 2004 News and views archives - since 1999 Search this site YellowTimes editorial on the Akha activist - April 28, 2004 ... In short, after a long reign of being the authority, it is my belief that he had become Joseph Conrad's character, Colonel Kurz, from his novel "Heart of Darkness" (Film, Apocalypse Now) about a westerner who makes himself a god among the hill tribes of Lao. He was given to delusions of grandeur and megalomania. He suffered from paranoia, and subscribed to conspiracy theories. Among the people he professed to hate were the government, the police, the army, the DEA, the missionaries, other NGOs, the CIA, journalists, researchers, photographers, The Shan State Army, Americans, backpackers, tourists, Thais, and any person, connected with any project involved with the Akha, other than his own. He even hated the volunteers who came to help him in the village, calling them hippies with cameras and free loaders. Over half of the volunteers who worked with Matthew, during my time in the village, either left, or were kicked out, after a heated argument... ...Irrespective of personality flaws, over-zealous behavior, and indelicate treatment of our Thai hosts, Mathew's cause, helping the Akha people, was a just one. And now, there is no one to take up the baton. Matthew McDaniel responds - April 26, 2004 Matthew McDaniel, the detained Akha activist, responds to comments made on 2Bangkok.com last week about the Akha.org website: The site sounded shrill? Is that as in the sound that and Akha makes when they are beaten to death? Shrill is something people say when the reality they are looking at can not possibly make them feel more comfortable than they already are. The real reason, and the ongoing reason that people don't speak out about the Akha situation is because they too feel they would loose their beer and hooker licenses in the Kingdom if they took up the life and death cause of these people. To not like a website is not convenient reason to not know the facts. And had you or more people asked that facts be verified, you would have found out that the facts were very easy to verify, and that being the case, the site was not accusations or shrill, it was very serious data that just didn't meet people's desired view of Thailand or the world. I reported on murders, torture, disappearances, extortion, the removal of children, all of it, and it was all based on request from the Akha and facts, none of it speculation, there was far too much going on for me to need to water down my work looking at speculation rather than real cases, which I couldn't keep up with anyway. So I hope that you will take a look at army reports, other reports, and consder that web sites are not based on how much money can be spent to build them but on how readily one can verify the cases they identify? The chances for people at the Post or the Nation to come up and see the cases were ample. The Bangkok Post ran numerous cases till they were reprimanded by the Army, then claimed that I was exagerating, that the cases were not there, which was an outright lie, and quit covering the stories. This was in events where wives lost husbands who have not come home to this day and the Bangkok Post was cowardly in the extreme to say that I exagerated these cases, as in maybe their husbands were on extended drunks that lasted years, and that really they were not dead, not murdered by the Thai army after all. But then the newspapers wouldn't look good and could be shut down if they printed the truth, all of the truth, all of the time about what was going on in Thailand, rather than a constructed reality about things like Thai forestry stealing all the hilltribe land, and the forced prostitution of a good percentage of the female Thai population. Country wouldn't look like land of smiles then now would it? Problem with Falangs in Thailand is they start thinking with corrupted little minds just like the Thais. The truth is not flexible Matthew McDaniel Matthew McDaniel also comments in a separate email about the details of his arrest: ...I just now last evening got back to Oregon after 9 days at immigration detention. I was never told I was charged with a crime by the Thais but am told by the embassy now that I was charged with violation of the Thai immigration law and was arrested under section 54(12)7 of Thai immigration law stating that I was a nuisance or danger to the public. Of course the Thais could not tell me how this occurred, what the danger was, as in was I protecting Akhas from being killed, therefore I was dangerous, if one considers that maybe killing Akhas is a normal process and not killing them is dangerous. The Thai Human Rights Commission came to IDC and decided to take my case and investigate it. ...The arrest itself put the Akha situation in many newspapers and media sites around the world. This case follows on the tail of the Special UN Envoy Hina Jilani whom I saw last year in Chiangmai, who is the Envoy for Human Rights Defenders, speaking out at Geneva and saying that Thailand was failing to protect its human rights defenders. The technical term for what happened to me is "retaliation against a human rights defender(HRD)" ...We will be identifying Thai exports and trade partners in the western world, and beginning calls for international boycotts of trade and tourism to Thailand including but not limited to Thai Airways... Embassy helping activist in Thailand - Statesman Journal, April 22, 2004 ...Matthew McDaniel, 46, remains jailed in the Immigration Detention Center in Bangkok, where he has been held since his arrest a week ago. He will be deported at the “earliest opportunity,” a U.S. Embassy spokesman said. The embassy is helping McDaniel find a flight from Thailand to the United States and to gather his own money to buy an airline ticket. ... McDaniel was being held under a Thai immigration law that allows deportation of people whose behavior is dangerous to the security of the public and the nation, the embassy spokesman said. The Thai government revoked McDaniel’s visa. All of McDaniel’s years in Thailand have been supported by 30-day or 90-day tourist visas, which alone stretched Thai immigration law, the spokesman said. ...Portland human-rights activist Edith Mirante said she can imagine what McDaniel is going through. Mirante has followed McDaniel’s work since she met him several years ago. In 1988, she was imprisoned in the detention center where McDaniel is detained now. She later was deported. She thinks her detention was an attempt by the Thai government to make an example of her. Mirante said McDaniel has exposed what he thinks is the role of the Thai government in exploiting the tribal Akha people... Matthew McDaniel's site has been updated. Earlier: U.S. activist detained at Immigration - The Nation, April 17, 2004 We have followed this person's website for some time, but never linked because it was full of shrill accusations and looked like a crank's site (one enormously long page, various text sizes, hysterical headlines, etc.). Recently, it was switched to a slashcode-type interface and started to seem a bit more mainstream. It will be interesting to see how this case turns out... City hall in fresh bid to install electronic traffic light system - Bangkok Post, April 22, 2004 City hall wants to re-introduce the area traffic control system--electronic gadgets controlling traffic lights at intersections--to alleviate congestion... He said the ATC system would be installed at over 200 intersections within a 150-sqkm radius from the Ratchada ring road. The installation is expected to be completed by 2007. In its 1993 plan, the BMA wanted to install the ATC system at 369 intersections plan. However, lack of cooperation from traffic police stalled implementation, and sensory detector sets placed under roads were destroyed by excavation projects. Under the current system, traffic lights are programmed to change every three minutes or more, and the police switch to a manual system when the traffic becomes congested. However, the time period of traffic congestion at an intersection is longer and more unpredictable. The average traffic congestion timespan at the intersection between Vibhavadi and Paholyothin roads in front of Central Lat Phrao was 800 seconds, or over 13 minutes. Mr Chitchanok said motorists would have to wait only 180 seconds or three minutes under the ATC system... Latest from Chang Noi - April 12, 2004 It is Monday and thus time for another tough editorial from The Nation. The harshest editorials (like this one) are written under the pseudonym "Chang Noi" (Little Elephant). From 'The politics of police abduction', The Nation, April 12, 2004: "There is nothing under the sun that the Thai police cannot do." Open the website of the Thai police and you will find this saying of Phao Sriyanon proudly displayed. He is considered one of the founding fathers of the modern police department, and is celebrated in its internal history. He is also widely believed to have ordered the abduction and murder of several prominent figures during the late 1940s and 1950s, including MPs, Muslim political leaders, journalists and businessmen. His famous saying has a terrible ring. Thaksin quoted it in his speech launching the "war on drugs" on 14 January last year... Chang Noi has written about Phao Sriyanon in the past (Anything under a dictator’s sun, January 20, 2003). Considering the horrible reputation Phao had both in his own day and through the prism of history, it is amazing (and telling) to find his threatening quote on the police website. Chang Noi's website. Tale of two newspapers - April 9, 2004 Farang affairs in The Nation mentions 2Bangkok.com's "tale of two newspapers" from last week. Be sure to take a look at the item in Farang affairs about an Aussie journalist on a press junket for Thai Airways who ended up writing an unflattering article about nightlife. Earlier 'Tales of Two Newspapers' Also: Do not miss the First looks at the Phetchburi, Queen Sirikit Convention Center, and Hua Lampong subway stations (Photo: 2Bangkok.com) Dye your shirt while you wait? - April 9, 2004 A man on a Lat Phrao soi provides a mobile cloth-dyeing service, complete with fire-heated bucket of dye on his bicycle. Many services are provided down long sois, with the seller making a sound of some kind on a horn, loudspeaker, or a small drum (in the man's hand) to alert neighborhood people. Segways in Thailand - April 9, 2004 Don Entz points out the article about the Segway Tours in the "Horizons" section of yesterday's Bangkok Post. Here is the Segway Tours website. One year ago - April 19, 2004 A year ago the government was riding high coming of its anti-drug drive. It could pick and choose the issues or new ground it wanted to break, so April 1, 2003 was confidently chosen as the end of piracy in Thailand. We came across this selection of translations from Thai papers from a year ago made by an EC organization in anticipation of elimination of pirated goods: (The EC_ASEAN Intellectual Property Rights Cooperation Programme (ECAPII) - Report of Thai Press Monitor - coverage of IP-related stories - Period Monitored: 1-14 March 2003) * Trigger Co.,Ltd, is implementing the CIPITC court ruling that it owns the Thai font PSL, said it has reached a proper understanding with a number of printing houses which agreed to pay subscription fee for the use of the PSL font. * In a market survey of pirated CD trade ahead of the 1 April crackdown, Prachachart Turakit (3-5/3) reported brisk trade going on as usual in the Chatuchak weekend market, Panthip Plaza, KlongThom flea market downtown Bangkok and beyond. Cheap pirate CDs,DVDs remain popular among both Thais and foreigners. Imports of pirated CDs, DVDs continued in the border provinces in the north and northeast. A number of shops surveyed offer a mixture of both copyrighted and pirate products. Traders reported that pirate product manufacturers may move facilities into Burma and Laos to avoid crackdown in Thailand. * In a letter from readers published by mass circulation Thai Rath, a lady wrote to protest "how police and those who claim to represent rights holder of cartoon characters that appear in kids and adult clothes harassed vendors who sell infringed products." The lady claimed to be subject to a "well organized raid, taken to an office in Sathorn Road," where those rounded up were presented with a letter, eventually resulting in 20,000-30,000 baht fine in order to avoid law suit. The columnist responded that even though the government's right in enforcing copyright, it should not allow "lucrative loopholes" to arise in the process of enforcement. * DCM Wattana said he has been informed by the US Ambassador to Thailand that the US government is practising a policy of blacklisting landlords and owners of premises that allow trade in pirated products, in which US businesses would boycott such people as well as those who do not cooperate with the US authorities in suppressing IP infringements. High on the sanction list include the well-known spots of pirate CD trade centres namely Pantip Plaza, Tawanna, MBK, Future Park Rangsit, and CP (owned by DCM Wattana's in-laws) which owns Fortune Tower, Seri Centre and Seacon. DCM Wattana vowed to take stern action against mall owners that ignore trade of infringed products in their premises. * A senior executive of one of Thailand's major rice exporters discovered trademark infringement -- Chinese rice wearing the jasmine rice label of his company-- while travelling to Chongqing province of China in the Commerce Minister's delegation recently. * DCM Wattana said he plans to present the government 's intensive campaign to eliminate piracy between 1April to end of June and the outcome to the APEC meeting which Thailand will host with a view to impress the US, so that the US will remove Thailand from its IP Watch list. He said that if his effort fails, he will ask the Prime Minister to bring up the issue at the summit level meeting. How did this happen? 13:10 - Bomb blast at Had Yai railway station - The Nation, April 10, 2003 Correction: no bomb blast in Had Yai - The Nation, April 10, 2003 - "News input was an error" 16:08 - These two articles have already vanished from The Nation site. Warning to cell-phone users: 'Stay away from power poles' - The Nation, April 9, 2004 Is this an urban legend? It seems similar to urban legend about the dangers of cell phones at gas station: A senior academic yesterday warned people against using their cell phones close to high-voltage power poles - a move that exposes them to the risk of electric shock and their phone exploding... Turning off the cell phone did not mean the user could safely get closer to the pole, he said. Discharges of electromagnetic waves from cell phones could cause a spark and attract a flow of electricity from the poles to the phone, thus subjecting its user to the risk of fatality... Wisarut notes: Mobile phones exploding when used under the high power lines is a real danger since such an incident electrocuted a mobile phone engineer... even though he survived, he needed to have both legs amputated. This incident also has been reported in local Thai press. Surakiart's secret connections - The Nation, April 10, 2004 ...Bangkokian couldn't help but wonder what Beijing would say if and when they find out about Surakiart's secretive Taipei connection. Surely the minister must realise that as a permanent member of the UN Secretary Council, Beijing could easily shoot down his rosy dreams? Encircled - April 5, 2004 Don Entz sent in this interesting photo of CDG House (right) and LPN Tower (left) encircled by the expressway. Bangkok in 2008 - April 3, 2004 Pas of Bangkok Highrises writes: ...this is what I think the Bangkok skyline (Chidlom, Pratunam, and Silom) will look like 5 years from now, taking into account the proposed buildings and assuming that all the buildings that are currently on hold would resume construction this year or the next. Two images: Bangkok in 2003 (134kb) and Bangkok in 2008 (136kb). (Photo: Don Entz) Cambodian logs to Thailand - April 6, 2004 Global Witness was expelled from Cambodia for bringing to light activities like this (from a press release from Global Witness, 'Laundering of illegal timber undermines forestry reform in Cambodia,' February 20, 2004): In 2000, the Thai company Thitikarn Ltd. obtained a permit authorising it to collect "branches and tree stumps" in Oddar Meanchey province. Instead, it purchases square logs from military-supervised illegal logging operations which focus on stripping out the province’s remaining stands of luxury timber trees. In mid 2003 the company was each month exporting 600 cubic metres of luxury wood, worth approximately $345,000, to Thailand. Thitikarn operates under the protection of Oddar Meanchey Governor Lay Virak and deputy governor Mao Tim, as well as units of the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces, police, military police, border police, customs authorities and Ministry of Environment officials. Amidst a recent high-profile crackdown on luxury timber dealers in Siem Reap and Oddar Meanchey provinces orchestrated by the Forest Administration, Thitikarn continues to operate uninterrupted. As of the end of January, its compound in O’Pouk village, near O’Smach, contained at least 700 cubic metres of illegally-harvested luxury wood, guarded by Battalion 42 soldiers commanded by Colonel Meak Vong. The impunity which Cambodian officials grant Thitikarn contrasts with the action taken by Thai authorities in August 2003, when Thai Forestry Police raided a Thitikarn warehouse in Bang Na, Thailand, seizing luxury wood from Cambodia and Laos worth around $250,000. Protesting the raid, Thitikarn publicly defended its plunder of Cambodia’s natural resources; claiming that by confining its operations to Cambodia, this would help reduce illegal logging in Thailand. April Fool's roundup - April 2, 2004 The Bangkok Post ran its own variation of the BBC's 'spaghetti tree' hoax and well as reprinting the Myron Kropp piano recital, first published in 1967. The Irrawaddy had this: Black Elephants Up in Arms - Say White Elephants Getting Royal Treatment: More than ten thousand African-Burmese elephants marched through the streets of Burma’s city centers at 9 a.m. to demonstrate against the centuries-old custom of treating white elephants as auspicious symbols of divine blessing and the black variety as an inferior beast of burden. "Black elephants are elephants too," read the banner of one protesting elephant in the coastal town of Sittwe. "I’m black and I’m proud," read another in the Kachin State capital of Myitkina. (Last year The Irrawaddy had this: Myanmar to send troops to end Iraqi dictatorship) And circulating among those who follow Khmer politics is this oddity (attributed to Nhan Dan, a Vietnamese newspaper): 'Hun Sen Youngest Daughter to Wed King Norodom Sihanouk' - ...Upon questioning of the Cambodian Ambassador's entourage, our reporter was able to find out that the beautiful Miss Hoach, all in her 16 years of age, was sent by her father to attend the needs of His Majesty the King. Also, with her parents approval, Miss Hoach is to wed King Sihanouk on April 12, 2004 at his royal palace in Pyongyang. According to anonymous source from the Cambodian Embassy in Beijing, Nhan Don has learned that the wedding ceremony will be officiated by His Excellency Kim Jong Il in person as no religious authority are allowed in North Korea... Also: Sorry, but we couldn't help it - April 3, 2004 The Nation has its own wrap up of April foolishness... Historic Bangkok gears up for 222nd birthday - TNA, March 30, 2004 ...The celebration, announced by Bangkok Governor Samak Sundaravej yesterday, will take place on 6-13 April. Whereas previous Ratanakosin celebrations have taken place almost exclusively on the historic Sanam Luang ceremonial ground in front of the Grand Palace, this year the celebrations will take place in seven separate locations around the Ratanakosin Island. Events will include performances of traditional music and dancing, a mock-up of the ancient Giant Swing ceremony, a re-creation of a traditional floating market, handicraft displays, and exhibition on the history of education in Thailand, a ‘food street’ and observances of traditional Buddhist ceremonies. Mr. Samak expressed hope that the festival would not only celebrate the capital’s most historic district, but would also help boost tourism and give Thai young people an opportunity to learn about and conserve their national heritage.