Security tightened, checkpoints scan for weapons as Red Shirts nationwide set to enter Bangkok

BANGKOK, March 12 (TNA) – Thai government security forces on Friday tightened protective measures in Bangkok with checkpoints set up across the capital and surrounding provinces to strictly screen incoming travellers and transport for arms and explosives as the anti-government movement mobilises what it claims as one million protesters to join their mass protest planned to overthrow the Abhisit Vejjajiva administration.

Combined military, police and municipal security personnel set up checkpoints in Bangkok’s inner area, starting from the Supreme Court, Sanam Luang, and Ratchadamnoen Avenue through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to search suspected vehicles, especially pickup trucks and motorcycles, to prevent smuggling of possible weapons and related material.

Additional closed circuit television monitors (CCTV) have been installed in several spots to monitor the situation and will be used as evidence if any violence occurs, while security measures at and around Government House, Army headquarters, the 1st Army Area headquarters, and the residences of important figures, have been tightened.

The Red Shirt protesters of the United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship (UDD) across the country are scheduled to depart their provinces Friday to join the group’s mass rally in Bangkok on Sunday.

The UDD earlier said 100,000 pickup trucks will be used to transport its supporters to the capital. Other protesters can meet at five meeting points across Bangkok and at Ayutthaya’s Wang Noi. People from the North can convene in Nakhon Sawan, while residents from the Northeast meet at Nakhon Ratchasima’s Pak Chong district.

At Wang Noi, an important gathering point for the UDD activists, one hundred riot police have been deployed to maintain order and search suspected cars to scan for weapons.

At a department store in Nakhon Ratchasima’s Pak Chong district, a temporary stage has been erected as a meeting point for Red Shirt supporters arriving from the northeast. UDD supporters there will move to the capital in the afternoon.

Acting national police chief Pol Gen Patheep Tanprasert said that two to three companies of police will be stationed at Wang Noi and work with military personnel there to inspect every car heading to Bangkok.

Following speculation by the Red Shirt leaders over possible clashes between protesters and police at Pratunam Pra-in checkpoint, Gen Patheep reaffirmed that police will not use violence against the protesters.

The police chief said the protesters can join the mass rally if they are unarmed, adding that if the situation intensifies, police have prepared staged response measures to handle the crowd, starting from talking, and then increasingly firmer measures up to using teargas if necessary to disperse an unruly crowd. (TNA)