The incident stays one of many deadliest in Thailand’s long-running armed rise up in southern provinces.
Thailand has mentioned it is going to prosecute eight former safety officers over the 2004 Tak Bai massacres, by which 78 protesters suffocated after being arrested and crammed into military vans.
Wednesday’s announcement by the lawyer common’s workplace comes simply weeks earlier than the case’s statute of limitations expires on Oct. 25 and after a Thai courtroom final month accepted a associated grievance in opposition to seven former senior safety officers filed by the victims’ households.
“The suspects might have foreseen that their actions would have led to the suffocation and demise of the 78 individuals below their accountability,” mentioned spokesman for the general public prosecutor, Prayut Bejaguran, at a information convention.
The incident stays one of many deadliest within the long-running battle in Thailand’s predominantly Muslim southern provinces. The protesters had been killed after being arrested at an illustration exterior a police station after which piled on prime of one another behind Thai army vans.
The then authorities, led by Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, expressed remorse over the deaths however denied wrongdoing.
In the meantime, police initially mentioned some protesters had been armed.
Greater than 7,600 individuals have been killed in some 20 years of unrest in Thailand’s predominantly Muslim provinces bordering Malaysia.
Thaksin’s daughter, Paetongtarn Shinawatra, grew to become Thailand’s prime minister final month.
Final week, a courtroom in Narathiwat summoned a former army commander and issued arrest warrants in opposition to six retired senior safety officers after they failed to look for a felony listening to on a grievance filed by the households.
The commander is now a politician from the ruling Pheu Thai Get together.