Friday, April 8, 2011
Wednesday, April 6, 2011
Thailand’s hill tribe people
A couple of years ago my wife and I went Chiang Mai and visited a hill tribe village, among other things. I took these pictures of of the Karen tribe and as you can see they wear amazing neck bands to extend their necks, hence the term the ‘long necked’ hill tribe.
We spent a good few hours in the village looking at the hand made goods that they had made to sell to the passing tourists. It was a fascinating day and we thoroughly our time there.
We spent a good few hours in the village looking at the hand made goods that they had made to sell to the passing tourists. It was a fascinating day and we thoroughly our time there.
CIA hitman Bill Young found dead in Chiang Mai
Killing was part of the job' said former agent described as 'a retired James Bond
BY EDWARD LOXTON
An American missionary's son who became a top CIA Vietnam War-era hit-man in the jungles of Burma, Laos and Thailand has been found dead in his Chiang Mai home, a bullet in his head, a revolver in one hand and a crucifix in the other.
"Bill Young died as he once lived - violently," said a friend.
William Young was 76, a tall, lean, modest and quietly spoken man who belied the image of a CIA killer. He was likened by his British friends to a retired James Bond.
"He was an extraordinary individual who led an extraordinary life," said the US Consulate General in Chiang Mai, the main city of northern Thailand, in a death notice.
Despite his action-packed CIA career, Young drifted into quiet retirement in his rambling home on the outskirts of Chiang Mai. Disowned by the CIA after challenging US policy in Vietnam and Laos, Young worked at home for the US Drug Enforcement Administration, using the contacts he had built up over the years among the hill-tribes of Laos and northern Thailand.
I visited him over a period of several weeks, working on the script of a film about his extraordinary life. Our long recording sessions were broken regularly by phone calls from his contacts, conducted in at least four different hill tribe languages.
Bill was most at home among the Lahu, who inhabit the mountains of Laos and northern Thailand. Lahu mourners packed a Chiang Mai church, together with other hill tribe representatives, for a traditional ethnic funeral service today.
Hundreds of hill tribe people in traditional dress, including members of the warlike Wa, are expected to attend the burial on Wednesday in Chiang Mai's Foreign Cemetery, a leafy corner of the city watched over by a bronze 19th century statue of Queen Victoria.
Bill's grandfather was a Baptist missionary who converted thousands of Lahu tribespeople in British-controlled Burma in the late 19th century. His father, Harold, also a missionary, pioneered the CIA connection by joining the American intelligence service and conducting spy missions in southern China after Mao Ze Dong's Communists ousted the Kuomintang.
Bill was born at a mission station in Burma and grew up in hill tribe villages, learning at least five local languages and forging friendships that were later to help him in his dangerous espionage work.
Harold Young's Washington connections secured Bill a CIA post, and soon the young operative had gathered an army of several thousand Lahu warriors to help disrupt communist supply lines running through Laos during the Vietnam war. "Killing was part of the job," he told me, detailing several scenes where he had shot his way out of tight corners in remote hill tribe villages.
Although Laos was officially neutral, US special forces penetrated deep into the landlocked country as the Vietnam war raged, while US aircraft bombed border sections of the Ho Chi Minh trail which carried North Vietnamese supplies southwards. The US did all it could to cover up its Laotian operations, which came to be described as the 'Secret War'.
At the height of the fighting, Bill was air-dropped into the mountains of central Laos to find a suitable site for an airfield base. He scoured the mountainous, forested terrain on foot and finally found an ideal valley near the Plain of Jars. (The photograph at the top of the page, which was on display in Young's living room in Chiang Mai, was taken during this period.)
The CIA operation known as Air America based itself there and within months the
Taxis blockade Phuket cruise passengers
The luxury cruise liner Silver Spirit at Phuket Deep Sea Port this morning.
Phuket Marine Police chief Phuripat Theerakulpisut makes a point
during today's emergency meeting at the Deep Sea Port.
PHUKET: -- The latest tuk-tuk and taxi blockade at the Phuket Deep Sea Port led to a victory for the drivers, who from today will be given a “50-50 share” of access to disembarking cruise ship passengers.
Vice Governor Nivit Aroonrat, Phuket City Police chief Chote Chitchai and local Marine Police brokered the agreement at about noon today, four hours after the blockade was set up.
Many of the 472 passengers aboard the Silver Spirit cruise liner had planned to take half-day minivan tours of Phuket, returning to the vessel before its scheduled departure at 1pm.
Their Phuket experience will not be a fond one, however, as they were not allowed past the blockade of some 200 angry taxi and tuk-tuk drivers.
The drivers were protesting the fact that local tour agents pick up most of the passengers who disembark from cruise ships at the port, leaving them with no work and no income.
“We have discussed this with the tour agencies and local authorities 10 times already over the past year, but still nothing has been done,” Taweesak Jumpada, a local taxi driver at Ao Makham for the past 12 years, told the Phuket Gazette.
Japanese tour operator Osaki Takumi said, “We had four Japanese guests who have booked a half-day round-trip tour, but now they cannot enjoy that as the ship is scheduled to leave at 1pm.”
The passengers are on a cruise from the Malaysian island of Penang to Columbo in Sri Lanka.
One of the tourists, 50-year-old Brazilian Marlove Araujs, said she and her husband were disappointed that their half-day tour had to be canceled.
“I have been to Phuket once before and I was very much looking forward to having another look around,” she said.
Another tourist, 66-year-old Schettle Roland, of Luxembourg, said, “This is bad. I came here 10 years ago. I didn’t plan to go inland myself, but I am not sure tourists will want to come to Phuket if they are greeted like this.”
One of the taxi drivers who helped reach the agreement, 50-year-old Narin Kebsup, said he was part of a 160-member collective of local taxi and tuk-tuk drivers.
Drivers wait all day for fares at the port, only to find that their time has been wasted when tour operators send their own vehicles to collect passengers, said the 20-year veteran driver.
As part of the agreement worked out today, tour operators will now have to inform the taxi and tuk-tuk co-op when they plan to use their own vehicles, he said.
The latest blockade was aimed at the management of the Sea Tour travel agency, but the Ao Panwa taxi co-op has shown in the past they are ready to take on all comers when they feel their interests are at stake.
In June last year a similar blockade was staged to stop US Navy seamen from taking buses paid for by the US military to points in Patong.
It was later reported that US military personnel had been the subject of at least three similar blockades, yet US Embassy staff downplayed the incidents and continued to insist Phuket was a preferred port-of-call for off-duty servicemen.
-- Phuket Gazette 2011-04-06
This is what you can expect when you arrive at by sea or at the airport. It really is time that the Government did something to protect the rights of the tourists.
Rick
Tuesday, April 5, 2011
Thailand: Webmaster Under Trial
Chiranuch Premchaiporn (known to friends as Jiew), editor of Prachatai.com, has been charged in court by authorities in Thailand for violating the country's Computer Crimes Act. Prachatai, which means ‘Free People', is an independent web portal in Thailand.
Photo of Jiew from the website of Digital Democracy.
An overview of the case is provided by FACT (Freedom Against Censorship Thailand). Jiew is accused of allowing ten Lèse majesté [anti-royal family] comments to be posted on Prachatai’s public webboard.
She had already deleted the comments when she received a removal notice from the state, but this didn’t stop the authorities from arresting her last year. Jiew is facing 50 years in prison if found guilty.
Thailand has strict Lèse majesté laws, and the country is aggressive in blocking websites which are deemed insulting to the monarchy. Censorship intensified last year when a national State of Emergency was declared in response to the anti-government Red Shirt protests. It is estimated that at least 425,296 web pages are blocked in Thailand.
Jiew’s trial has been closely monitored by netizens, journalists and human rights advocates. Global Voices Advocacy has daily reports of Jiew’s five trial sessions held this month, written by CJ Hinke – days one, two, three, four, and five. The next trial date has been postponed to September 2011.
Why is Jiew's case important? She is being prosecuted not for something that she wrote in her website but for comments posted by other people
People's Alliance Suggests Conflict between Defense, Foreign Ministries
People's Alliance Suggests Conflict between Defense, Foreign Ministries
UPDATE : 5 April 2011
The People's Alliance for Democracy comments that the detention of two Thai activists in Cambodia is being used as a political ploy by the Cambodian government, which wants former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra to benefit.
The group also points to a possible conflict between the Defense and Foreign ministries concerning the Thai-Cambodian conflict.
People's Alliance for Democracy, or PAD, spokesman Parnthep Puapongpan commented that the Thai government could have done more to pressure Cambodia to release two jailed Thais, Weera Somkwamkid and Ratree Pipattanapaiboon, through economic and military means.
He noted that he understands the struggle the families of the two are going through to try to secure their release, including going to the opposition Pheu Thai Party and former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra for help.
Parnthep also said the comment by Defense Minister General Prawit Wongsuwan that the Thai-Cambodian General Border Committee, or GBC, meeting should not be held in Indonesia and should not include foreign observers conflicts with the policy of the Foreign Ministry which welcomed Indonesian troops to observe the Thai-Cambodian border area.
Meanwhile, PAD coordinator Prapan Khoonmee said Weera and Ratree's detention is becoming a political ploy for the Cambodian government to help Thaksin by having him negotiate their release in return for benefits.
Praphan said the government should not proceed with any meeting with Cambodia at this time as it is about to leave office but should hand over the issue to the next government.
He said the PAD will continue with its protest as long as there is no clarity on the Thai-Cambodian border conflict.
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