Pubdate: Tue, 25 Feb 2003
Source: Bangkok Post (Thailand)
Copyright: The Post Publishing Public Co., Ltd. 2003
Contact:  http://www.bangkokpost.co.th/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/39

INSTANT JUSTICE CAN CARRY A HIGH COST

Three weeks into a massive drugs crackdown, there are disturbing reports of 
wholesale violations of human rights and the law. These reports require 
careful attention if the government hopes to receive long-term support for 
its policy against illicit drugs.

Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra announced his tough crackdown on drug 
dealers will continue, as it should. But the premier should also be willing 
to investigate the growing, widespread and universal reports of murders and 
massive legal violations by some of those involved in the campaign. 
Credible reports and complaints claim police and officers of pthe state at 
high levels are targeting or setting up suspected petty drug dealers for 
extra-judicial killings. Authorities must look into such reports seriously, 
end legal abuses or risk the reputations of both the Thaksin government and 
the country.

This newspaper and others have reported at length on the disturbing abuse 
of national intelligence agencies. Police and civil authorities have told 
reporters of ``blacklists'' of drug suspects. The reports claim such 
information has been used to compile death lists. An investigative report 
in this newspaper yesterday detailed how police and local authorities 
compare lists of drug suspects. If a name appears on both lists, the man or 
woman is marked for murder.

The government has been too cavalier in handling such charges in the early 
days of its 90-day drug campaign. Police officers admit to killing 15 drug 
sellers who resisted arrest. The death toll, meanwhile, stands at more than 
600. The police position is that all other deaths have involved influential 
drug dealers killing petty street dealers in order to protect themselves.

Surely such cases have occurred. The drug trade is highly profitable and 
deadly vicious. But it strains the national credulity that every drug 
murder is a matter of dealer-killing-dealer. It does not square with the 
promise of Interior Minister Wan Muhamad Nor Matha that drug dealers might 
``vanish without a trace''. Nor does it square with the words of one 
policeman who spoke to a reporter last week, wondering: ``Why should we 
spare the scum?''

Human rights groups in Thailand and elsewhere are already highly sceptical 
of the government's programme, critical of the huge number of killings, or 
both. The United Nations Commissioner for Human Rights will investigate. Mr 
Thaksin seems to feel he can withstand pressure from overly sensitive and 
misguided Thais and foreigners alike on the issue.

This seems a short-sighted approach to such an important matter. Indeed, 
the prime minister's gamble could backfire. His highly-popular and 
well-intentioned plan to fight the street-side drug peddlers could get 
sidetracked in an international investigation. The claims of the premier 
and ministers that the lives of drug sellers don't matter are highly 
questionable at best, and offensive to many. But the lives of their 
families definitely matter. And when _ not if _ the death squads inevitably 
kill innocent bystanders or mistake their targets, that will matter, no 
matter if the killers are drug gangs or police.

Mr Thaksin has indicated he considers the reports of human and civil rights 
violations as criticism, and he famously rejects criticism. But this time 
he is wrong. The reports of criminal activity by police and local officials 
are piling up in the Thai and foreign press. Not just ``do-gooder'' groups 
like Amnesty International are asking for justice, but so is the United 
Nations. Reports of violations and widespread murder are not just local, 
but are coming from across the country.

The cost of ignoring accusations of massive human rights violations is they 
will come back to bite the government and society. The benefits of a 
violent drug programme will fade, but the widows, orphans and grieving 
parents will stay with us. Authorities can count on wide public support for 
a determined crackdown on drug peddlers and traffickers. There is no need 
to go outside the law and resort to tactics which currently stain the 
reputations of police and local government alike.
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MAP posted-by: Jo-D