(Bangkok, 17 October 2008) The Network of Concerned Citizens on Thailand today submitted a petition letter to the Professor Saneh Chamarik, the Chairperson of the National Human Rights Commission of Thailand (NHRCT) at its office on Phraya Thai Road in downtown Bangkok.

The petition is signed by more than 220 students, academia, human rights defenders, and ordinary citizens from all walks of lives calling for two demands to the NHRCT. Firstly it calls for the sub-committee lead by Mr. Surasee Kosolnawin to investigate not only human rights violations committed by the police officers on the 7 October 2008 incident but also the violations committed by the People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD), a right-wing alliance that has been calling for an end to electoral democracy.

It is reported that at least 400 protesters and 40 police officers are injured from the clash, when the PAD protesters tried to block the parliament preventing the Prime Minister to deliver the policy speech and forcing parliamentarians to leave the parliament. One protester was also killed, while another died in a yet to be resolved incident when his car blew up.

It was reported that there were also cases of police officers being run over by a PAD supporter driving a pickup truck, fatally shot at, and some were brutally assaulted by the PAD protesters. At least two are seriously injured when they were stabbed by flag poles used by the PAD protesters.

Secondly the group, which a loose network of students, academic, human rights defenders, and ordinary citizens that have campaigned for the respect of human rights and fundamental freedoms by all groups in Thailand’s political crisis, also called for the sub-committee to broaden its mandate to cover the cases of human rights violations committed by the PAD prior to the 7 October incident such as the clashes between the PAD and pro-government Democratic Alliance against Dictatorship on 2 September 2008, which resulted in a death of DAAD member and at least 40 more injured, the instigation of hatred towards academic and activists who hold different views than the PAD, and the possession of weapons such as knives, slingshots, and metal pipes by the PAD’s supporters during their rallies.

In the petition, the network urges the NHRCT to look at whether the above actions by the PAD are contradictory to international human rights law, particularly the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights which Thailand is a party to since 1996. Reference was made to whether PAD’s action is contradicting to the violation to the right to life, the respect to rights and reputations of others, and the abuses to the right to peaceful assembly.

PAD has been criticized by the international media and international human rights groups for its tactics to provoke and incite violence. This came after the PAD started to attack political figures on stage who constructively criticize PAD and their actions of violence such as the raid on the state-owned NBT station and the government house in earlier this year.

Some of the signatories to the petition includes Baramee Chairat of the NHRCT Sub-committee on land and forest reforms, Bandit Tanachaisetwut of the NHRCT Sub-committee on labour rights, Bencharat Sae-chua of Mahidol University’s Office of Human Rights and Social Development, Thongchai Winichakul of University of Wisconsin-Madison, Kasian Tejapeera of Thammasat University’s Faculty of Political Science, Artef Sokoh, the Secretary General of Student Federation of Thailand, and Pratabjit Neelaphaijit, Ph.D. student in Political Science at Chulalongkorn University.