Examination on Civic Leadership and General Sense of Superiority To be taken by Prime Ministers, Test Writers for Civic Duty classes, Administrators of Triam Udom Suksa School who are not psychiatrists but can still diagnose mental illness from test answers, and True Believers in True Thainess.

Ladies and, er, … Start again. One hundred and nine gentlemen.  Captain Yu-er Phuct and his 218-member cabin crew would like to welcome you aboard this China Repatriation Airlines flight to Life Imprisonment.  We look forward to serving you in the best traditions of Chinese human rights.

Military claim ‘vicious harassment’, appeal to NHRC The military junta who have taken total control of Thailand have started to make public complaints of political harassment, claiming that ‘unscrupulous opposition forces’ are mounting relentless attacks that leave them humiliated, frustrated and barely able to administer the country.

A call to summarily sack the Bangkok Governor over recent flash floods in the city has started an outpouring, nay, an overflow of similar calls. The Stop Global Warming Association called on Prime Minister and NCPO leader Gen Prayut Chan-o-cha to use his powers under Article 44 of the Interim Constitution to sack Bangkok Governor MR Sukhumbhand Paribatra.  The Association blamed the Governor for the fact that a torrential overnight downpour caused widespread flooding on Monday morning, paralyzing traffic and deluging newspaper front pages with pictures of watery wastes.

International pressure is building on Bangladesh and Myanmar to take urgent measures to save boatloads of stranded asylum seekers in danger of death by drowning or starvation in the Bay of Bengal.  The ramshackle boats, thought to be loaded with Riphab refugees from Thailand, are organized by people smugglers, who prey on the migrants, often selling them into virtual slavery if they manage to make landfall undetected.