Red Shirts remain defiant after attempts to remove them left over 800 injured; army retreats, calling for a truce after protesters took five soldiers hostage.
Bangkok
Photo by: AFP
A protestor gets his picture taken next to a seized army armoured vehicle after overnight clashes between the army and “Red Shirt” protesters in central Bangkok on Sunday. Demonstrators vowed to remain on the streets of the Thai capital and bring down the government, the day after the country’s worst political violence in nearly two decades.It’s frightening. We heard explosions and people were running all around.
DEFIANT Red Shirt Thai protesters vowed Sunday to keep up their bid to topple the government, after the country’s worst political violence in almost two decades left 21 dead and over 800 injured.
Protest leaders, who have promised to maintain their campaign until the government dissolves parliament and calls fresh elections, demanded Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva step down and leave the country.
Seventeen civilians, including a Japanese TV cameraman, and four soldiers were killed in Saturday’s crackdown on the Red Shirt supporters of fugitive ex-premier Thaksin Shinawatra in Bangkok, the emergency services said.
On Sunday evening Red Shirts gathered to mourn the loss of their comrades at the city’s Democracy Monument – the scene of a fierce battle on Saturday – where grieving relatives led a procession holding up gold-framed pictures of the dead.
They were followed by crying men carrying caskets, a couple containing bodies draped with Thai flags and flowers. Some onlooking protesters prayed and others waved red banners.
