Today a Thai military court sentenced a man to
prison for 25 years for posting pictures on his Facebook page deemed insulting
to Thailand’s monarchy. In a closed-door court sentencing, Tiensutham
Suttijitseranee, a 58-year-old businessman, was found guilty of posting
defamatory content.
“The court decided that because he posted five
pictures with captions last year that the court deemed defamatory, he would be
sentenced to a total of 50 years; ten years for each picture posted, reduced by
half to 25 years,” lawyer Sasinan Thamnithinan told Reuters, adding that the
term was halved because Tiensutham pled guilty. The court did not allow his
relatives and reporters to attend the verdict.
Thailand’s lese-majeste law is the world’s harshest
and makes it a crime to defame, insult or threaten the king, queen or heir to
the throne or regent. New Prime Minister, Prayuth Chan-ocha (Above), has repeatedly
vowed to vigorously pursue royal insult cases and try those perceived to be anti-monarchists.
He even had an elderly man jailed for 1-1/2 years this month for scrawling
graffiti in a Bangkok shopping mall toilet.
Today Prayuth said he had asked for King Bhumibol
Adulyadej’s (Above), 87, permission to lift martial law, which has been in
place since before the coup 10 months ago, replacing it with a law that
maintains the army’s wide-ranging powers.
No comments:
Post a Comment