Wat Wanlayangkoon, a democracy advocate and award-winning writer and who fled Thailand after being summoned by the military junta, passed away on the night of 21 March in France where he had been given refugee status.

(Right) Wat Wanlayangkoon

Wat’s daughter Wajana posted the news on her Facebook page on 22 March, saying that further details would be provided later.

According to a BBC Thai report, Wat underwent surgery for a tumor in his liver in mid-2021. The operation was a success but he was later readmitted for a severe infection which damaged many of his organs. In late January, Wat’s family in Thailand was informed that his chances of recovery were low.

As a result of a fundraising effort by Wat’s friends in art and literary circles, Wat’s three offspring were able to fly to France and meet him in the hospital on 5 February.

Wat was born on 12 January 1955 in the Talung Sub-district of Lop Buri’s provincial center. He and his wife Asna had three children: Wana, Wasu and Wajana. He was a prolific writer who produced a number of well-known works, including the novels Transistor Love Chant (mon rak transistor) which was later made into a film, White Dove (pirab khao) and Distilled from Blood (klun chak sai luad).

On a number of occasions, his literary works were shortlisted for South East Asian Writers Awards (S.E.A Write). In 2007, he also received a Sriburapa Award. Named after the pseudonym of pro-democracy writer Kulap Saipradit, the prize is given to outstanding artists, writers and journalists.

As a child, Wat became interest in writing, producing poems and books for classmates as well as submitting short stories to the school magazine. In 1970 he caught the attention of the public when one of his short stories was published in Armoured Vehicles magazine, a monthly magazine made by the military-owned Armoured Vehicle radio station.

In the 1970s, Wat helped to produce Atipat, a newspaper published by the National Student Center of Thailand, the main umbrella organisation for Thai student activists during the period. As a result of the experience, he got to know many writers and activists. Following a brutal state-backed assault on students at Thammasat University on 6 October 1976, he fled Bangkok for the forest, only returning in 1981.

More recently, Wat attended the protest led by United Front of Democracy Against Dictatorship (UDD), the Red Shirt movement, after the 2006 coup that ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra. He fled the kingdom in 2014 after receiving 2 summonses to report to a military facility following the 2014 coup led by Gen Prayut Chan-o-cha.

Wat’s concerns that he would be charged for opposing the junta were well-founded. A warrant  was issued for his arrest under Section 112 of the criminal code, the lese majeste law, for his participation in “The Wolf Bride”, a play that was deemed insulting to the monarchy.

Wolf Bride actors Pornthip Mankhong and Patiwat Saraiyaem were also charged and detained. Another actor, Siam Theerawut fled to Vietnam only to be reportedly extradited back to Thailand along with two other political refugees, Chucheep Cheewasut (Uncle Sanam Luang) and Kritsana Tapthai.

Wat told BBC Thai that after leaving Thailand, he spent 7 months in Cambodia and then traveled to Laos to live with other Thai political refugees. After the suspicious deaths of two of them - Chatchan Bupphawan and another activist nicknamed Kasalong - and the disappearance of a third, Surachai Sae-dan, Wat decided to request asylum from the French Embassy in Laos. He was accepted and arrived and France in 2019.

“It is a repositioning. The best method for now is to retreat.  Being out of jail is better than being in one.  Politics has become unpredictable, that is why I pulled back. My strategy is to fight as a free person, not give in to barbaric power,” said Wat in an interview with Prachatai in 2016.

Asked how long he would need to ‘reposition,’ he laughed and said, “I don’t know. None of us know the future. But it looks like I might not need to that much longer.”

Wat leaves behind a final manuscript, an account of his years in exile.