What It Is And How It Toppled Thai Leader Yingluck Shinawatra

Thailand Rice Subsidy Scheme: What It Is And How It Toppled Thai Leader Yingluck Shinawatra

By  Shuan Sim,  @ShuanSim, s.sim@ibtimes.com

on January 23 2015 10:27 AM

Click on the link to get more news and video from original source: http://www.ibtimes.com/thailand-rice-subsidy-scheme-what-it-how-it-toppled-thai-leader-yingluck-shinawatra-1792788

Former Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra arrives at Parliament before the National Legislative Assembly meeting. Yingluck was impeached over her controversial rice subsidy program Friday. Reuters

Former Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra was impeached Friday for her role in a rice subsidy program that cost the Thai government billions. The rice subsidy that was supposed to help farmers eventually saw Yingluck ousted from the government, sparked protests and led to the former government leader’s expulsion from Thai politics for five years. So how did the subsidy program work exactly?

The rice program introduced in 2011 sought to buy rice from local farmers at above-market prices, stockpile them to drive up global prices, and then sell them for increased revenue. Thailand was the world’s largest exporter of rice at the time and had the clout to affect prices of the staple. The program was earlier promoted by Yingluck’s brother Thaksin, who was the former prime minister and is now exiled from the country.

The program was one of the main campaign messages that Yingluck’s Pheu Thai party ran on, winning her party a landslide election in 2011. “It helped those with lower incomes earn more,” she said at her impeachment hearing on Thursday, according to Reuters. “Farmers are the backbone of the country.” Farmers account for 23 percent of Thailand’s 67 million people.

The subsidy was popular with farmers initially as they expanded their production in Thailand’s rural north. “I wanted to get more money,” farmer Jaroen Namhap told the Wall Street Journal. “Many other farmers in this district decided to do the same thing by expanding the amount of land used to grow rice. The government was offering such a good price. It was much better than selling to rice mills.”

However, the program went south when India returned to the rice export market after a long absence, and prices dropped worldwide. Yingluck’s government began to run out of money to support the subsidy, and many farmers are still waiting for payment from the government for the rice they turned in. Rice farmers had threatened to park 100 tractors at the Thailand airport in protest.

Yingluck’s rice subsidy program supposedly cost the government some 500 billion Thai baht ($15.3) in losses. Thailand’s National Anti-Corruption Commission found Yingluck guilty of corruption last May for ignoring flaws in her program to advance her populist political agenda. “The rice subsidy is fraught with weaknesses and risks at every level, leading to corruption and impacting the state budget, farmers and the country’s fiscal position,” Commissioner Vicha Mahakun said at a news conference announcing the panel’s verdict, according to the Wall Street Journal.

The Thai Constitutional Court removed Yingluck from office in May, sparking protests from the pro-Yingluck faction known as the Red Shirts. Opposition to Yingluck’s government, comprising many of the country’s traditional elite, planned their own rallies, too. A military junta, the National Council for Peace and Order, was established at the ousting of Yingluck and has imposed martial law since May.

Thailand’s current National Legislative Assembly is mostly comprised of military officers put in place by the junta government, known for its strict censorship laws and nationalist policies. Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha had said he did not order the NLA to vote to indict Yingluck, according to Reuters. Yingluck also faces criminal charges for the rice subsidy program that could see her jailed for up to 10 years.

“Thai democracy has died along with the rule of law,” Yingluck said in a statement posted on her Facebook page, reported by Reuters. “I will fight until the end to prove my innocence, no matter what the outcome will be. And most importantly, I want to stand alongside the Thai people. Together we must bring Thailand prosperity, bring back democracy and truly build justice in Thai society.”

Press Release: CPPA – 10 Point Appeal During Laos, Hmong Review

10 Point Appeal During Laos, Hmong Review Saturday, 24 January 2015, 12:24 pm Press Release: CPPA

UN Human Rights Council in Geneva Receives 10 Point Appeal During Laos, Hmong Review

For Immediate Release, January 20, 2015,
Washington, D.C., Geneva, Switzerland, and Vientiane, Laos (Original Press Release Date: January 20, 2015)
Center for Public Policy Analysis

The Center for Public Policy Analysis (CPPA) and a coalition of non-governmental organizations, including prominent Lao and Hmong human rights groups, is appealing to the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva to sanction and condemn the government of Laos during its pending Universal Periodic Review (UPR) of the country’s human rights practices. The NGOs have released a ten-point (10 point) appeal to the member nations of the United Nations Human Rights Council, which convenes in Geneva on January 20, 2015, to take up the review of Laos’ controversial human rights record.

“Because of the important Universal Periodic Review of Laos’ deplorable and egregious human rights violations by the United Nations in Geneva, a coalition of non-governmental organizations, and Lao and Hmong human rights groups, are appealing to the member nations of the UN’s Human Rights Council to vigorously hold the government of Laos, and its military and communist leaders, fully accountable for a myriad of serious and systemic human rights abuses,” said Philip Smith, Executive Director of the CPPA in Washington, D.C. “Some of the leaders in Laos are clearly guilty of crimes against humanity, up and above their horrific human rights violations.”

“The one-party Marxist government in Laos, which is a de facto military junta run by the Lao People’s Army, continues to systematically engage in enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings of political and religious dissidents as well as minority peoples, including the ethnic Hmong,” Smith stated. “The Lao government’s ongoing, and intimate, military and diplomatic relationship with North Korea is also deeply troubling and has resulted in the brutal forced repatriation by Laos of North Korean refugees back to the Stalinist regime in Pyongyang that the asylum seekers have fled.”

Smith continued: “We are calling upon the Lao government to immediately provide unfettered, international access to missing civic leader Sombath Somphone and well as prominent Laotian and Hmong political dissidents, including the leaders of the Lao Students’ Movement for Democracy who have been imprisoned for over 15 years after leading peaceful pro-democracy demonstrations in Vientiane in 1999. We are also very concerned about numerous Hmong refugee leaders, forcibly repatriated from Thailand to Laos in recent years, as well as notable opposition leaders, such as Moua Ter Thao, who have disappeared into the Lao prison and gulag system, and who also appear to have been subject to enforced disappearances at the hands of Lao military and security forces.”

“The continued persecution, and extrajudicial killing of Lao and Hmong refugees and asylum seekers in the jungles of Laos, as well as horrific religious freedom violations against Hmong Christian and animist believers, are serious human rights violations that the United Nations in Geneva should hold the Lao government accountable for, and call their leaders forward to address,” said Vaughn Vang, Executive Director of the Lao Human Rights Council, Inc. (LHRC). “The Lao military is still heavily engaged in ethnic cleansing and large-scale illegal logging operations, involving military attacks and starvation of Hmong civilians, driving more and more minority peoples from their ancestral lands, including the Hmong people, who are still being forced from the mountains and the jungles of Laos, where their only option is to flee to Thailand, and other third countries, to seek asylum from persecution and death.”

The following is the text of the ten-point appeal to the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva:

We appeal to the member nations of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) to vigorously press the Lao government and military on its repeated and deplorable human rights violations. We request that the member nations of the UNHRC hold the authorities in Laos, and the Lao government and military, accountable for their egregious human rights violations, which must be condemned by the international community; and, we further petition Laos to:

1.) Provide immediate and unconditional international access to arrested civic activist Sombath Somphone, and all information related to his arrest and imprisonment;

2.) Provide immediate and unconditional international access to arrested student activist leaders of the Lao Students’ Movement for Democracy who were arrested following peaceful, pro-democracy protests in Vientiane, Laos, in October of 1999;

3.) Provide immediate and unconditional international access to all Lao Hmong refugee camp leaders of the Ban Huay Nam Khao (Huai Nam Khao) refugee camp in Thailand who were forcibly repatriated from Thailand to various camps and sites in Laos, including secret locations, in 2009;

4.) Stop the Lao military’s ongoing attacks against civilians, and illegal logging, especially in highland and minority populated areas; Provide immediate and unconditional access to international human rights monitors and independent journalists, to closed military zones, and military-controlled areas in Laos, where deforestation, illegal logging, military attacks, enforced starvation, and human rights violations continue against vulnerable minority peoples in Laos, including the ethnic Hmong people;

5.) Cease religious persecution of Laotian and Hmong religious believers, including Animists, Christians, Catholics and other faiths, who seek to worship freely, and independent of Lao government monitoring and control;

6.) Cease the forced repatriation of North Korean refugees and asylum seekers who have fled political and religious persecution in North Korea to Laos and Southeast Asia;

7.) Provide immediate and unconditional international access, especially to human rights monitors and attorneys, as well as independent journalists, to various high-profile Hmong-Americans imprisoned, or subject to enforced disappearance, in Laos, including Hakit Yang, of St. Paul, Minnesota, and his colleagues;

8.) Provide immediate and unconditional international access, especially to human rights monitors and attorneys, as well as independent journalists, to the high-profile Hmong opposition and resistance leader Moua Toua Ter recently repatriated from Thailand to Laos in 2014;

9.) Provide immediate and unconditional international access, especially to human rights monitors and attorneys, as well as independent journalists, to the two imprisoned Hmong translators, and alleged Hmong opposition members, who allegedly accompanied European journalist Thierry Falise, French cameraman Vincent Reynaud, and their American translator and guide, Rev. Naw Karl Mua in 2003, during their investigation into the Lao military’s persecution and attacks against the Hmong people, as documented by the Committee to Protect Journalists;

10.) Provide information, the whereabouts, and the fate of the accused Ban Vang Tao ( Vang Tao /Chong Mek border crossing point) alleged resistance and opposition leaders, and their alleged accomplices, reportedly involved in the July 2000 cross border attack on a Lao government customs post; International access should be granted to these individuals who were forcibly repatriated from Thailand to Laos prior to their trial, and court proceedings, in Thailand, as documented by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR); We are concerned about credible reports that these Lao citizens have been subjected to enforced disappearance, torture and extrajudicial killing by the Lao government; We request that the Lao government provide immediate and unconditional international access by human rights attorneys and international journalists to the accused Laotians who were unfairly denied a court trial in Thailand on the Ban Vang Tao case, since there is no independent judiciary or independent news media in Laos.

The ten-point appeal to the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva was issued by the CPPA, LHRC, United League for Democracy in Laos, Inc., Lao Students’ Movement for Democracy, Laos Institute for Democracy, Lao Hmong Students Association, Hmong Advance, Inc., Hmong Advancement, Inc., Lao Veterans of America, Inc., and others.

ENDS

Contact:

Jade Her or Philip Smith

Center for Public Policy Analysis (CPPA)

info@centerforpublicpolicyanalysis.org

http://www.centerforpublicpolicyanalysis.org

Tele. (202) 543-1444

2020 Pennsylvania Ave., NW

Washington, DC 20006, USA

Luxury Home Building by Lao Leaders Raises Eyebrows Among Citizens

2015-1-23

Click on the link to get more news and video from original source:http://www.rfa.org/english/news/laos/politicians-build-luxury-homes-01232015162351.html

Some top Lao politicians are building high-priced, luxury homes in the impoverished one-party communist country, raising questions among citizens about where the money is coming from, sources inside the country said.

Lao President Choummaly Sayasone is the latest top-level politician to build a pricey house and garden at a time when some low-level state employees and teachers are not paid their salaries on a regular basis.

Choummaly’s house in Thatluang village of Saysetha district in the capital Vientiane includes a 5 billion kip (U.S. $615,000) garden, a source with knowledge of the matter who did not want to be identified told RFA’s Laos Service, although he could not provide the price of the president’s house.

The building’s contractor, Phonesack Group Co. Ltd., hired Choey Studio Co. Ltd. to design and construct the garden, the source said.

The Phonesack Group has a good relationship with Choummaly’s family, he said, and is involved in logging, mining and other development projects in Laos.

Somsavath Lengsavath, the deputy prime minister, also has built a house which cost 20 billion kip (U.S. $2.5 million) in Nongniang village of Saysetha district.

The luxury homes have prompted Vientiane residents to question how and where the politicians are getting money from to spend on expensive construction and landscaping.

According to the World Bank, per capita annual income in Laos, a nation of 6.9 million people, was $1,450 in 2013.

“Can leaders answer my question about how much money they have after they combine all their salaries, allowances and bonuses?” asked one Vientiane resident, who declined to be named. “And how and where do they get the money to build the houses?”

Another Vientiane resident told RFA: “All of them build houses costing billions of kip. Where do they get the money from and why? Because they sell their signatures? This is a selling-signature time.”

Corruption problem

Many leaders in the Lao government, military and communist party engage in corruption and spend the proceeds on expensive homes and other luxury items, although corruption is a criminal act punishable by fine and/or imprisonment.

Top government officials in particular have been linked to the flourishing illegal timber trade between the country and neighboring Vietnam, according to sources who cite unofficial crossings along the border as conduits for the illicit activity.

Mining companies operating in provinces in southern Laos have claimed that some national leaders have pressured enforcement officials not to take action against the smuggling activity.

Corruption among high-level officials in Laos has been going on for years, if not decades.

Bouasone Bouphavanh, who was prime minister of the country from 2006 to 2010, called for a crackdown on corruption and luxurious living among government officials, according to media reports at the time.

He complained in a 2007 address to the Lao National Assembly, or parliament, that corruption and luxury were rife among government officials in the country.

Low-level bureaucrats, such as police officers and administrative workers, engage in corruption as well, using their authority to extract bribes from citizens.

Corruption in Laos is so widespread that it has deterred foreign investors, created problems with the country’s ability to enforce business contracts and regulation, and left many ordinary citizens impoverished.

In 2014, Lao ranked 145 out of 175 countries on corruption in the nongovernmental organization Transparency International’s corruption perception index, which scores nations on how corrupt their public sectors are seen to be.

Reported by RFA’s Lao Service. Written in English by Roseanne Gerin.

Campaigners call for Laos to answer for ‘disappeared’

Campaigners call for Laos to answer for ‘disappeared’

Update: 14:07, 20 January 2015 Tuesday

Click on the link to get more news and video from original source: http://www.worldbulletin.net/news/153392/campaigners-call-for-laos-to-answer-for-disappeared

file photo

NGOs say Laos must investigate enforced disappearances.

World Bulletin/News Desk

More than a hundred rights groups Tuesday called on UN members to highlight the case of Laotian civil society leader Sombath Somphone, missing for two years.

Somphone, a well-known figure involved in rural development, has not been seen since he was arrested by police in the capital Vientiane on Dec, 15, 2012.

A statement from 145 NGOs, under the umbrella of the Sombath Initiative, called on the members of the UN’s Human Rights Council in Geneva “resolutely address” the disappearance.

It added: “Enforced disappearance is a horrible crime, one of a few recognized internationally as unjustifiable under any circumstances.”

Laos is to appear before the council Tuesday.

Angkhana Neelaphaijit, an adviser to the Sombath Initiative, told The Anadolu Agency Tuesday: “The Lao delegation to Geneva says [Sombath’s disappearance] is an internal problem and that Lao authorities are investigating.

“But the CCTV evidence has disappeared and, from what I know, they are not continuing the investigation.”

After footage of Somphone’s arrest at a police checkpoint emerged, Laos refused assistance to enhance the quality of the images and the film has now apparently vanished.

Somphone set up a training center for young people and officials in 1996 and was awarded the prestigious Ramon Magsaysay award, sometimes described as Asia’s Nobel Peace Prize,  in 2005 for his community leadership.

“When Sombath disappeared, civil society in Laos got very scared,” Neelphaijit said. “Nobody wants to work anymore on human rights issues and even those working on development are very scared.”

The last time Laos was reviewed by the Human Rights Council, in May 2010, the communist government pledged to ensure freedoms of expression, assembly and religion, as well as combating people trafficking.

The Paris-based International Federation of Human Rights said the government has failed to make improvements.

“Six years after its signature, Laos has not yet ratified the international convention for the protection of all persons from enforced disappearance,” the Federation said in a statement.

“In addition, the government has failed to adequately investigate most cases of enforced disappearances.”

An investigation by The Anadolu Agency has documented at least 33 enforced disappearances in Laos since 2001.

“The Lao government has a long record of using enforced disappearances, oppressive laws, and long prison terms to silence its critics,” Philippe Dam, acting Geneva advocacy director at Human Rights Watch, said.

“Governments should use the opportunity of [a] UN review of Laos to make clear they stand with ordinary citizens against the abuses by unaccountable Lao officials.”

Laos, Hmong NGO Coalition Appeals to United Nations Human Rights Council to Sanction Lao Government Over Egregious Violations

Press Release

Laos, Hmong NGO Coalition Appeals to United Nations Human Rights Council to Sanction Lao Government Over Egregious Violations

January 20, 2015,

Washington, D.C., Geneva, Switzerland, and Vientiane, Laos

Center for Public Policy Analysis

The Center for Public Policy Analysis (CPPA) and a coalition of non-governmental organizations, including prominent Lao and Hmong human rights groups, is appealing to the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva to sanction and condemn the government of Laos during its pending Universal Periodic Review (UPR) of the country’s human rights practices.  The NGOs have released a ten-point (10 point) appeal to the member nations of the United Nations Human Rights Council slated to convene in Geneva today to take up the review of Laos’ controversial human rights record.

“Because of the important Universal Periodic Review of Laos’ deplorable and egregious human rights violations by the United Nations in Geneva, a coalition of non-governmental organizations, and Lao and Hmong human rights groups, are appealing to the member nations of the UN’s Human Rights Council  to vigorously hold the government of Laos, and its military and communist leaders, fully accountable for a myriad of serious and systemic human rights abuses,” said Philip Smith, Executive Director of the CPPA in Washington, D.C. “Some of the leaders in Laos are clearly guilty of crimes against humanity, up and above their horrific human rights violations.”

“The one-party Marxist government in Laos, which is a de facto military junta run by the Lao People’s Army, continues to systematically engage in enforced disappearances and extrajudicial killings of political and religious dissidents as well as minority peoples, including the ethnic Hmong,” Smith stated. “The Lao government’s ongoing, and intimate, military and diplomatic relationship with North Korea is also deeply troubling and has resulted in the brutal forced repatriation by Laos of North Korean refugees back to the Stalinist regime in Pyongyang that the asylum seekers have fled.”

Smith continued: “We are calling upon the Lao government to immediately provide unfettered, international access to missing civic leader Sombath Somphone and well as prominent Laotian and Hmong political dissidents,  including the leaders of the Lao Students’ Movement for Democracy who have been imprisoned for over 15 years after leading peaceful pro-democracy demonstrations in Vientiane in 1999.   We are also very concerned about numerous Hmong refugee leaders, forcibly repatriated from Thailand to Laos in recent years, as well as notable opposition leaders, such as Moua Ter Thao, who have disappeared into the Lao prison and gulag system, and who also appear to have been subject to enforced disappearances at the hands of Lao military and security forces.”

“The continued persecution, and extrajudicial killing of Lao and Hmong refugees and asylum seekers in the jungles of Laos, as well as horrific religious freedom violations against Hmong Christian and animist believers, are serious human rights violations that the United Nations in Geneva should hold the Lao government accountable for, and call their leaders forward to address,” said Vaughn Vang, Executive Director of the Lao Human Rights Council, Inc. (LHRC). “The Lao military is still heavily engaged in ethnic cleansing and large-scale illegal logging operations, involving military attacks and starvation of Hmong civilians, driving more and more minority peoples from their ancestral lands, including the Hmong people, who are still being forced from the mountains and the jungles of Laos, where their only option is to flee to Thailand, and other third countries, to seek asylum from persecution and death.”

The following is the text of the ten-point appeal to the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva:

We appeal to the member nations of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) to vigorously press the Lao government and military on its repeated and deplorable human rights violations.  We request that the member nations of the UNHRC hold the authorities in Laos, and the Lao government and military, accountable for their egregious human rights violations, which must be condemned by the international community, and we further petition Laos to:

1.)1.) Provide immediate and unconditional international access to arrested civic activist Sombath Somphone, and all information related to his arrest and imprisonment;

2.) 2.) Provide immediate and unconditional international access to arrested student activist leaders of the Lao Students’ Movement for Democracy who were arrested following peaceful, pro-democracy protests in Vientiane, Laos, in October of 1999;

3. 3.) Provide immediate and unconditional international access to all Lao Hmong refugee camp leaders of the Ban Huay Nam Khao (Huai Nam Khao) refugee camp in Thailand who were forcibly repatriated from Thailand to various camps and sites in Laos, including secret locations, in 2009;

4.)4.)  Stop the Lao military’s ongoing attacks against civilians, and illegal logging, especially in highland and minority populated areas; Provide immediate and unconditional access to international human rights monitors and independent journalists, to closed military zones, and military-controlled areas in Laos, where deforestation, illegal logging, military attacks, enforced starvation, and human rights violations continue against vulnerable minority peoples in Laos, including the ethnic Hmong people;

5.)5.)   Cease religious persecution of Laotian and Hmong religious believers, including Animists, Christians, Catholics and other faiths, who seek to worship freely, and independent of Lao government monitoring and control;

6.) 6.) Cease the forced repatriation of North Korean refugees and asylum seekers who have fled political and religious persecution in North Korea to Laos and Southeast Asia;

7.)7.) Provide immediate and unconditional international access, especially to human rights monitors and attorneys, as well as independent journalists, to various high-profile Hmong-Americans imprisoned, or subject to enforced disappearance, in Laos, including Hakit Yang, of St. Paul, Minnesota, and his colleagues;

8.)8.) Provide immediate and unconditional international access, especially to human rights monitors and attorneys, as well as independent journalists, to the high-profile Hmong opposition and resistance leader  Moua Toua Ter recently repatriated from Thailand to Laos in 2014;

9. 9.) Provide immediate and unconditional international access, especially to human rights monitors and attorneys, as well as independent journalists, to the two imprisoned Hmong translators, and alleged Hmong opposition members, who allegedly accompanied European journalist Thierry Falise, French cameraman Vincent Reynaud, and their American translator and guide, Rev. Naw Karl Mua in 2003, during their investigation into the Lao military’s persecution and attacks against the Hmong people, as documented by the Committee to Protect Journalists;

10)10.) Provide information, the whereabouts, and the fate of the accused Ban Vang Tao ( Vang Tao /Chong Mek border crossing point) alleged resistance and opposition leaders, and their alleged accomplices,  reportedly involved in the July 2000 cross border attack on a Lao government customs post; International access should be granted to these individuals who were forcibly repatriated from Thailand to Laos prior to their trial, and court proceedings, in Thailand, as documented by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR); We are concerned about credible reports that these Lao citizens have been subjected to enforced disappearance, torture and extrajudicial killing by the Lao government;  We request that the Lao government provide immediate and unconditional international access by human rights attorneys and international journalists to the accused Laotians who were unfairly denied a court trial in Thailand on the Ban Vang Tao case, since there is no independent judiciary or independent news media in Laos.

The ten-point appeal to the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva was issued by the CPPA, LHRC, United League for Democracy in Laos, Inc., Lao Students’ Movement for Democracy, Laos Institute for Democracy, Lao Hmong Students Association, Hmong Advance, Inc., Hmong Advancement, Inc., Lao Veterans of America, Inc., and others.

##

Contact:

Jade Her or Philip Smith

Center for Public Policy Analysis (CPPA)

info@centerforpublicpolicyanalysis.org

http://www.centerforpublicpolicyanalysis.org

Tele. (202) 543-1444

2020 Pennsylvania Ave., NW

Washington, DC 20006, USA