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Thai state workers threaten general strike
The Associated Press , Bangkok | Fri, 11/21/2008 6:46 PM | World
Thailand's labor federation for state workers threatened Friday to go on strike next week if the government does not step down, after a grenade attack on anti-government protesters killed one and wounded 29.
Sawit Kaewwan, secretary-general of the State Enterprise Workers Relations Confederation, also urged its nearly 200,000 members to join a weekend demonstration by the protesters.
The federation of 43 unions represents workers at state companies including Thai Airways, the national railroad, and water, telephone and electric utilities.
The anti-government protest group, which calls itself the People's Alliance for Democracy, plans a mass rally on Sunday followed by a march to Parliament, where it says it will block a Monday parliamentary session.
The last time the group blockaded Parliament, street battles with police left two dead and hundreds wounded. The Oct. 7 clashes were the country's worst political violence in more than a decade.
Deputy House Speaker Apiwan Wiriyachai said Monday's parliamentary session would not be moved to a new location to avert a potential confrontation.
The protest group is seeking the government's resignation because of its ties to former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, who was toppled by a 2006 military coup for alleged corruption and abuse of power.
It has been occupying the grounds of Government House, the government's main offices, since late August. A grenade was thrown at the site early Thursday morning, killing one protester and wounding 29.
No one took responsibility for the blast, but the alliance blamed the government, a charge denied by Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat, who is Thaksin's brother-in-law.
"We want to urge our members to join a protest against the murderous government which no longer has any legitimacy," labor federation chief Sawit said. "If they do not resign or if they use violence against innocent civilians, all of us will strike nationwide." He declined to elaborate, saying the details would be discussed next week.
The federation also threatened a general strike in support of the protest alliance in September but it failed to take place. Only the state-run railway went on strike for a week.
Thaksin's critics fear he plans to stage a comeback with the government's help. He fled the country in August to avoid a jail sentence on a conflict-of-interest conviction.
Thaksin remains higher popular among poor Thais living in the countryside for his populist policies, but faces fierce opposition from the protest alliance and its sympathizers - monarchists, the military and the urban elite - who viewed his government as deeply corrupt.
The hardening of the positions of his supporters and opponents threatens to extend a political crisis that began when the alliance first called for Thaksin to step down in early 2006.
"There is a high risk of more violence and lawlessness as long as there is no political breakthrough," said Panithan Wattanayagorn, a political analyst from Bangkok's Chulalongkorn University.
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