Tag Archives: 서울출장마사지

He was convicted in absentia of conflict of interest in 2008 and sentenced to two years in prison

Tags : 부산출장샵 서울출장마사지 인천출장샵

The universal assumption is that the Supreme Court will confiscate at least part of Thaksin’s fortune, which was frozen after his ouster in a 2006 coup that was staged because of his alleged corruption and abuse of power.

The big question is whether Thaksin supporters will react to the verdict with riots. That could usher in a painful new chapter in Thailand’s political crisis after four years dominated by a bitter and sometimes violent rivalry between the allies and foes of the former telecommunications tycoon.

Thaksin won two landslide election victories and remains popular among Thailand’s rural poor who benefited from his policies. But he is generally loathed by the urban elite, including in the military and bureaucracy, who contend he sought to usurp the power of the country’s revered constitutional monarch, King Bhumibol Adulyadej.

Ahead of Friday’s verdict, Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva’s government has called in the troops. More than 20,000 soldiers and police will be on alert nationwide – with about 6,000 in Bangkok, the capital. Judges have been offered safe havens. Banks have been told to stock extra cash to accommodate panic withdrawals.

The verdict is timed to minimize the blow to Thailand’s stock market, which like the economy and tourism industry have suffered through the instability. Judges will begin reading their ruling at 1 p.m. and are expected to finish after the market closes ahead of a three-day holiday weekend.

“If everybody remains calm and accepts the (ruling), Thailand will get through this situation,” Abhisit said Wednesday.

Thaksin supporters say the talk about violence is government propaganda designed to discredit them. The pro-Thaksin Red Shirts, known formally as the United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship, 대구출장샵 say no protests are scheduled for Friday but a peaceful “million man march” will be held March 14 in Bangkok.

The 60-year-old Thaksin, who jumped bail and fled the country in 2008, is currently based in Dubai.

Thaksin plans to give a running commentary on Friday’s proceedings by holding a live videolink as judges read the ruling, which will be broadcast to supporters from the headquarters of the opposition Puea Thai party, which is allied to him, the party said.

“If I don’t receive justice, I will fight for it in every way,” Thaksin told supporters earlier this week via videolink. “I am willing to negotiate. But if I am persecuted and bullied, I will not tolerate it.”

Thaksin’s served as Thailand’s prime minister for five years until he was unseated by the September 2006 coup. Critics accused the tycoon-turned-politician of massive corruption and abusing his power by shaping government policy to enrich his family’s telecommunications empire. He was convicted in absentia of conflict of interest in 2008 and sentenced to two years in prison.

A nine-judge panel at the court’s special Criminal Division for Political Office Holders will determine if Thaksin concealed his assets after becoming prime minister and used his office to enrich himself. His 76.77 billion baht ($2.29 billion) fortune was frozen after the coup and is reportedly stashed in more than 100 bank accounts and other investments belonging to himself, his now ex-wife, his children and other relatives.

Judges will consider several cases of Thaksin’s alleged policy abuse, including a multimillion dollar government loan to Myanmar in 2004. Thaksin is accused of endorsing the US$127 million low-interest loan in exchange for the junta’s purchases of satellite services from Shin Satellite, then controlled by Thaksin’s family.

The Supreme Court’s decision technically cannot be appealed – it is the highest court – though defense lawyers have 30 days after the ruling to submit new evidence deemed significant to the case.

Thailand is talking about little else at the moment. The mostly anti-Thaksin national media have been counting down to the verdict for weeks, calling it “The Big Day,” and “Judgment Day.”

Thaksin supporters are demanding fresh elections and say their real mission is to end injustice in Thai society where the real power is held by the elite. They say Abhisit took power illegitimately after court rulings unseated two post-coup governments led by Thaksin allies.

“We can expect to see some assets – if not all – confiscated by the Supreme Court,” said Thitinan Pongsudhirak, a political scientist and director of the Bangkok-based Institute of Security and International Studies. “But it would not put an end to Thailand’s crisis, because now Thaksin’s supporters the Red Shirts … have evolved into their own force to be reckoned with.”

“They are more than just Thaksin now, and Thailand’s problem now is more than just Thaksin.”

Baradar was captured in a joint Pakistani-U.S

Tags : 대구출장샵 부산출장샵 서울출장마사지

Islamabad, however, is sticking by it’s insistence that it’s received no formal request to turn him over and that he could be tried first in Pakistan.

Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar is one of at least three Afghan Taliban commanders who have been captured in recent weeks in Pakistan, where militants have also sustained blows from suspected U.S. missile strikes, including four killed Wednesday in an al Qaeda and Taliban stronghold in northwest Pakistan, intelligence officials said.

Meanwhile, an Afghan official said Thursday that Pakistani officials had confirmed the arrest of another top Taliban commander, Abdul Kabir. Siamak Herawi, a spokesman for Afghan President Hamid Karzai, said Thursday that Kabir was detained a week ago in Pakistan.

The arrest of Kabir, who ran Taliban operations in eastern Afghanistan, is part of a recent crackdown on insurgents in Pakistan that included the arrest of Baradar.

Pakistan has agreed to transfer Baradar to Afghan custody, according to sources in the Afghan Interior Ministry and Presidential Palace, who spoke to CBS News’ Fazul Rahim on condition of anonymity.

The agreement came after the Afghan Minister of Interior met Pakistan’s Prime Minister and made the request on behalf of President Karzai, reports Rahim. The officials played down any significance of visiting FBI director Robert Mueller’s presence in the negotiations, but the move to Afghan custody will give U.S. interrogators much greater access to Baradar.

The date and details of the handover have not been set, but the sources tell Rahim it is expected in the near future.

Pakistani Interior Minister Rehman Malik said Islamabad was expecting a formal request from the Afghan government to hand over Baradar, but the ministry issued a statement saying that no transfer was imminent.

“Pakistan will make legal scrutiny and also investigate the criminal acts done by Mullah Baradar, including his illegal entry into Pakistan,” the statement said. “If Mullah Baradar has committed any crime inside Pakistan, he will be first tried in Pakistan.”

However, a senior Pakistani official, speaking on condition of anonymity to CBS News’ Farhan Bokhari, says the public denial of a deal to hand Baradar over is meant primarily to try and limit public outcry from political opponents in Pakistan.

The official told CBS that, “without the FBI director’s visit, we would not have yielded ground,” though he said there was agreement on all sides that admitting a prominent U.S. role in the negotiations would be counterproductive.

Baradar was captured in a joint Pakistani-U.S. operation in the southern city of Karachi early this month, and has given some useful information to Pakistani interrogators, Pakistani officials have said. It is unclear if American officials have had direct access to Baradar.

Malik said last week that Pakistan would not hand the Afghan suspects to U.S. authorities but would return them to their countries of origin if there was no proof they had committed crimes in Pakistan. The comment reflected the government’s sensitivity to widespread anger among many Pakistanis who think Islamabad too often does Washington’s bidding.

The arrests and missile strikes against militants are occurring amid signs of deeper cooperation between Islamabad and Washington — amid long-standing suspicions that Pakistani security officials retain links with the militant movement.

On Wednesday, three suspected U.S. missiles hit a compound and a vehicle in Dargah Mandi area of North Waziristan tribal region, said intelligence officials, 부산출장샵 who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to media on the record. The identities of the dead were not immediately clear, they said.

The area hit was a stronghold of the Haqqani network, an Afghan Taliban faction that is considered a major threat to U.S. troops across the border in Afghanistan. A missile strike in the same region last week killed Mohammad Haqqani, a son of the network’s aging leader, Jalaluddin Haqqani, officials said.

In Islamabad, FBI Director Robert Mueller met Pakistani and Afghan officials for talks on counterterrorism cooperation. Mueller also met separately with top officials at Pakistan’s intelligence agencies, the U.S. Embassy said in a statement. The statement offered few details, and did not mention if Baradar was discussed at the talks.

U.S. Gen. David Petraeus, who oversees the war in Afghanistan, said the arrests of the Afghan Taliban suspects were the result of intelligence breakthroughs, and dismissed the idea that Pakistan acted against Baradar because he may have been involved in reconciliation talks with the Afghan government and it wanted to get a seat at the table by arresting him.

“I wouldn’t share your characterizations that, in a sense, (the Pakistanis) have always had this intelligence,” Petraeus told reporters late Tuesday. “What has happened is that there has been some important breakthroughs.”

Over the past 18 months, Pakistan has undertaken several army offensives in the northwest against Islamist militants. Those operations have mostly targeted militants attacking the Pakistani state, not militants fighting U.S. and NATO troops in Afghanistan.

Petraeus said Pakistan still made distinctions between such groups, but that there appears to be an “evolution” in that it now sees them as increasingly entwined.

Also Wednesday, the bodies of two men alleged by militants to be U.S. spies were discovered in Mir Ali, a town in North Waziristan.

Each had a note attached accusing the victim of spying for the Americans and warning other informants they faced the same fate, area resident Akram Ullah said. Another witness, Sana Ullah, said one man was a local tribal elder and the other was Afghan.