'We Won't Sit and Watch:' Mothers of Jailed Thai Activists Call for Their Release
Voice of America
Bound by unconditional love for their children and anger at the Thai state, the mothers of pro-democracy protesters detained for weeks without bail for allegedly defaming the royal family are keeping vigils outside the prison where their loved ones are being held.
The vigils come as Thailand’s turbulent political landscape is rocked once more by a youth-driven protest movement demanding reforms to the entire power structure, including the previously untouchable monarchy, headed by King Maha Vajiralongkorn. Protests which drew tens of thousands late last year fizzled after key leaders were arrested, many under multiple charges of breaking the lèse-majesté law, better known as “112,” the harsh defamation measure which protects the palace from criticism. Each conviction under Section 112 of the Thai criminal code carries between three and 15 years in prison.Palestinians gather at the site of an Israeli strike on a camp for internally displaced people in Rafah on May 27, 2024. Fire rages following an Israeli strike on an area designated for displaced Palestinians, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, in this still picture taken from a video, May 26, 2024. Palestinians gather at the site of an Israeli strike on a camp for internally displaced people in Rafah on May 27, 2024. A member of the bomb squad of the Israeli police collects debris after a rocket fired by Palestinian militants struck in the Israeli city of Herzliya on May 26, 2024.
Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili, right, and Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze, left, leave a podium after marking Independence Day in Tbilisi, Georgia, May 26, 2024. Demonstrators with Georgian national and EU flags rally during an opposition protest against a foreign influence bill as they mark their country's Independence Day, in the center of in Tbilisi, Georgia, May 26, 2024.