|
Bangkok: Thai Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat was banned from politics for five years and his party disbanded on Tuesday, spurring exultant anti-government protesters to end their blockades of Bangkok's airports.
Government party members will switch to a new "shell" party already set up and they said they would vote for a new prime minister on December 8, setting the stage for another flashpoint in Thailand's three-year political crisis.
Chavarat Charnvirakul, a construction mogul and first deputy prime minister, was named interim leader, an official said.
Anti-government protesters cheered Somchai's fall after less than three months in power and their leader said they would halt all rallies, including blockades of Bangkok's airports.
People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD) leader Sondhi Limthongkul said they would start pulling out of Suvarnabhumi and Don Muang airports at 10am (7am GMT) today.
"We've finished our duty," said Sondhi, who had accused Somchai of being a pawn of his brother-in-law, Thaksin. "If a puppet government returns or a new government shows its insincerity in pushing for political reform, we will return."
The airports operator said it would decide today when passenger flights in and out of the capital could resume. While the chaos may soon be over for thousands of stranded travellers in Thailand, the country's wider conflict between forces loyal to ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra and Bangkok's royalist elites looked set to drag on.
Power play
"The divisions are so deep, it's difficult to see how it could be over," said political analyst Giles Ungpakhorn of Bangkok's Chulalongkorn University.
The Constitutional Court also disbanded two other parties in Somchai's six-party coalition for vote fraud in the 2007 general election and barred their leaders from politics for five years.
The rulings raised the risk of clashes between red-shirted government supporters, who forced the judges to find a new venue after surrounding the court, and yellow-shirted PAD protesters, who had invaded the airports in a "final battle" to oust Somchai.
Hours before the court decisions, one person was killed and 22 wounded after a grenade was fired at protesters at Don Muang.
Thailand's revered King Bhumibol Adulyadej made no mention of the country's troubles during a short speech at a Trooping the Colour military parade in Bangkok.
The annual ceremony, in which the king speaks about the need for military probity, was a picture of tradition and serenity, in marked contrast to the chaos elsewhere.
|
