33 student organisations and activists groups filed an open letter with the President of the Supreme Court today (3 October) to demand the release of political prisoners detained pending trial or appeal and to call for an end to the prosecution of citizens under the royal defamation law.

The Board of the National Health Security Office (NHSO) has approved an increased budget of 221.5 trillion baht for the National Health Security Fund for the 2024 fiscal year. 

At the Clooney Foundation for Justice’s award ceremony for the 2023 Albie Awards, lawyers from Thai Lawyers for Human Rights (TLHR) during their acceptance speech addressed the prosecution and detention of activists charged for political expression.

Last Thursday (28 September), local communities in Chiang Mai’s Omkoi District marched from the local municipal stadium to the District Office auditorium to protest against a coal mining project sited near their communities, while concerns have been raised of the risk of contamination of local farmland and air and water pollution if the mining project is allowed to go ahead.

A 21-year-old man has been sentenced to one year and four months on a royal defamation charge for sharing a Facebook post criticising King Vajiralongkorn's clothes in 2020.

A civil society network proposing a new marriage equality bill, a gender recognition bill, and a bill repealing the 1996 Prevention and Suppression of Prostitution Act is poised to launch a campaign to collect signatures to introduce the bills into parliament.

A civil society network is preparing to propose a gender recognition bill which would allow trans people to change the gender markers in their official documents to match their identities. It would also permit non-binary people to use gender-neutral markers and allow intersex people to employ gender neutral markers until they decide their gender orientation.

A 20-year-old man has been sentenced to three years in prison on a royal defamation charge after allegedly painting graffiti about monarchy reform during a protest at Din Daeng on 13 September 2021.

The Central Criminal Court for Corruption and Misconduct Cases has dismissed murder charges against four national park officials charged for the alleged abduction and murder of indigenous rights activist Porlajee “Billy” Rakchongcharoen, citing insufficient evidence.

Following the post-sentencing detention of human rights lawyer and activist Anon Nampa for royal defamation, the Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders and the Move Forward Party have issued statements condemning Anon’s sentencing and raising concerns about freedom of expression.

The Civil Court has ordered the police to pay damages to two reporters shot with rubber bullets while covering a protest in July 2021, as the police did not take care and did not use non-lethal weapons in the proper way. However, the Court ruled that this was not a violation of press freedom or an attempt at intimidating the press to stop their reporting.

The Royal Thai Police Commission yesterday passed, by a vote of 10 to 1, a resolution appointing Deputy Police Commissioner-General Pol Gen Torsak Sukvimol as the 14th Commissioner-General, succeeding Pol Gen Damrongsak Kittiprapas.