No let-up in Thai purge

Press, 18 October 1976, Page 9

No let-up in Thai purge

NZPA-Reuter Bangkok Policemen and troops yesterday continued to track down a list of suspected Communists and antiGovernment elements in a nationwide purge by Thailand’s new military rulers.

Police Director-General Srisuk Mahintorathap said he did not know exactly how many people had been arrested, but diplomatic sources put the figure in the hundreds. Apart from Thai nationals, policemen and troops have also been arresting Vietnamese and Cambodian refugees they have discovered in Bangkok daring the security operations.

Among these were ten Cambodians who had sneaked into Bangkok after escaping from their refugee camp near the Cambodian border.

On Saturday the police arrested 12 Vietnamese refugees who had moved out of their designated area without permission, and said they seized a quantity of Vietnamese Communist propaganda. A strict overnight curfew

was still clamped on the capital eleven days after the October 6 coup, and police officials said the question of whether it should be lifted or not would be considered daily.

Government sources said that a new constitution for Thailand — the old one was scrapped after the military take-over — would be promulgated before October 22.

The new constitution is expected to give wide arbitrary powers to. the Prime Minister-Designate (Mr Thanin Kraivichien), who said in an important policy speech last week that the country needed a period of slow step-by-step development toward the restoration of democracy. Mr Thanin is putting together a Cabinet which is expected to b'- announced within the next week.