Thread: Why did the negotiations fail?

Quote,

After big wins in the elections of 2001 and 2005, Thaksin, an autocratic CEO before entering politics, started running Thailand like the ultimate boss. He gutted theoretically independent institutions like the courts, the civil service, and the Bank of Thailand, promoting his loyalists and using public speeches to demean these institutions, which had helped stabilize Thailand for years. The opposition’s response further undermined Thai institutions. Rather than fight back at the polls, opposition leaders convened massive demonstrations that ultimately sparked a coup in 2006, forcing Thaksin into exile.

Originally Posted by StrontiumDog

Many are asking why peace talks failed, when the red shirts had little hope of resisting the troops. Insiders say that Mr Thaksin was a serious spoiler, as were General Khattiya and other radicals. In a dysfunctional and factionalised movement, internal talks bogged down. Some leaders balked at facing criminal charges without the guarantee of bail. But the leadership was also held hostage, in part, by its own rhetoric and the emotions stirred among its followers. Many were enraged by the April 10th slaughter and unimpressed by the six-month timeline for elections. “The mob would not allow them to give in so easily,” says a senior security official.

this is what we have been saying here all along, and yet those arguments were ridiculed and dismissed by the usual red clown brigade lead by DrB and friends (sabang among others)

Originally Posted by StrontiumDog

The final straw for the government—as well as moderate factions in the Red Shirts—came earlier this month when the protesters and government negotiators failed to agree on a deal on what would have enabled the Red Shirts to go home in exchange for elections in November.

People involved in both government and opposition camps say Mr. Thaksin urged hard-liners to come up with fresh demands that stalled the process, ultimately leading to the talks' collapse.

They say Red Shirt leader Veera Musikapong quit the negotiations in disgust.

duh !!! another confirmation by a different source. It's clear now that the reds fucked up as expected, because they were gambling with something they couldn't control, that is Thaksin and a desperate crowd. The government share also the responsibility for not acting decisively and failing the gravity of the situation which became apparent on April 10. The lack of police support certainly added to the situation.

Originally Posted by phomsanuk

He gutted theoretically independent institutions like the courts, the civil service, and the Bank of Thailand, promoting his loyalists and using public speeches to demean these institutions, which had helped stabilize Thailand for years.

and that is in part the reason of the crisis we are facing now, he destroyed the institutions that were supposed to be in place to restore the order of things using the 1997 constitution after Thailand returned to a fragile Democracy. After he broke down the nascent democracy, it lead to a political chaos and here we are now.

Election need to be suspended for the next 5 years to restore the system that Khun Thaksin has destroyed.

Nothing new there, Thaksin is at fault

The negotiations where broken by the Government with only insignificant details to correct, insignificant that is if the 5 point proposal was sincere at-all, dont, tell me that wether Suteph went to a police-station or the DSI was worth 30 life's and damages for billions, or putting a firm date on a parliament dissulution.

No what made the whole thing break down was that the very people that brought Abhisit into power disowned him in those last crucial moments, they accused him of weakness and demanded him to step down, his own people!!!

That pressure and pressure from other significant players forced Abhisits hand.

No sane government would choose the mayhem, murder and carnage, as opposed to giving into a few relatively insignificant technicalities seen in the light of the importance of the overall plan, and the advantages in solving such a serious conflict peacefully, if the interest of the whole country really was paramount in your thoughts, and not just the special interests of a minor elitist but very powerful group.

Originally Posted by StrontiumDog

People involved in both government and opposition camps say Mr. Thaksin urged hard-liners to come up with fresh demands that stalled the process, ultimately leading to the talks' collapse.

They say Red Shirt leader Veera Musikapong quit the negotiations in disgust.

My respect for Veera increased.

Yeah, Thaksin, the great unificator.

This certainly explains the completely nutty demands the Reds kept pushing back, after every reasonable offer from Abhisit's side. Typical.

It's not so much that Thaksin's a dumb idiot (we knew that already), it's how dumb the red leaders falling for this must have been, to not see where this would have led. What were they thinking? Jeff Savage and Connor Purcell sure do belong with them.

Originally Posted by larvidchr

No what made the whole thing break down was that the very people that brought Abhisit into power disowned him in those last crucial moments, they accused him of weakness and demanded him to step down, his own people!!!

Please elaborate as I seemed to have missed this.

Originally Posted by larvidchr

That pressure and pressure from other significant players forced Abhisits hand.

Likewise. Please name these significant players and the proof that you have.

Originally Posted by Gallowspole

Originally Posted by larvidchr

No what made the whole thing break down was that the very people that brought Abhisit into power disowned him in those last crucial moments, they accused him of weakness and demanded him to step down, his own people!!!

Please elaborate as I seemed to have missed this.

Originally Posted by Gallowspole

Originally Posted by larvidchr

That pressure and pressure from other significant players forced Abhisits hand.

Likewise. Please name these significant players and the proof that you have.

The leaders of the yellow-shirt organization issued several statements in the final days demanding Abhisit to step down, they criticized the 5 point plan and called it unacceptable and Abhisit weak, It was posted in some of the threads running on the conflict here on TD, else google is your friend.

As for the last question, there are many international observers with interesting views, you will have to use the www.

Lav? Can you reply, please? You have stated that the WSJ and The Economist are liars. Please back up your accusation.

Originally Posted by Gallowspole

Lav? Can you reply, please? You have stated that the WSJ and The Economist are liars. Please back up your accusation.

Where did he do that ?

He just said that some have interesting views, or ?

Originally Posted by Gallowspole

the negotiations stopped at the end of March/ beginning of April not the 6/7 April.

Televised negotiations started 28 March and stopped a couple of days later.

29 March, PAD issues this statement.

"BANGKOK, March 29 (TNA) - Thailand's anti-Thaksin yellow-clad People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD) on Monday announced the group's opposition to the rival Red Shirt's proposal to dissolve the House, saying it's not the way out of the country's polarised political crisis."

Yellow Shirts object to Red Shirt proposal on House dissolution

Non televised negotiations continued to "clarify" agreement to find a "political" solution. Promise of November elections still on the table.

6 May, PAD holds demonstrations.

13 May, Abhisit "scraps" November election promise.

"Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva has scrapped an offer to hold an early election this year after anti-government demonstrators refused to end their two-month-old protest, officials confirmed Thursday."

Thai premier scraps early election proposal

19 May troops move in to disperse demonstrators.

Originally Posted by Norton

Televised negotiations started 28 March and stopped a couple of days later.

If you had continued reading the post you would've seen that I highlighted that error and corrected it.

Originally Posted by Gallowspole

Edit: sorry the negotiations stopped at the end of March/ beginning of April not the 6/7 April. Last edited by Gallowspole : Yesterday at 09:18 PM.

Gallowspole, this is Issues, when I first posted an answer to you, I told you where to go look, later Norton has been kind enough to help find it for you, so what I stated was that Abhisits own support base put pressure on him to end the protests with force, and it seemed to work. Norton have posted the prof kindly so that should count as qualifying my remark, If you have not been following events and are unaware of significant events, the least I can ask is that you go look it up, I'm not a library for you to play in.

The second part with other influential party's is an Issue we are not allowed to debate here on TD, you can like that or not, but no matter how much you ask that is all you are going to get.

I made no comments as to wether opinion pieces in news are more lies that any other opinions, they are just opinions like our own, and only backed up by hearsay as far as the WSJ especially is concerned, and as such less valid than most since they refer to no named sources. The Economist piece is far more balanced.

I mostly base my opinion on actual events, like the yellowshirt pressure on Abhisit, that still is ongoing, there is another thread about that with the PAD criticizing Abhisit again.

I also based my opinion on the known facts that where the stumbling stones in the negotiations acknowledged by both party's, 1 Suthep went to DSI (he is the boss of the DSI) the UDD wanted him to go to the normal Police, 2 the firm date of parliament dissolution.

Those two things cant possibly have been enough to make the Government choose death and mayhem, so the logic conclusion must be that there where other political motives behind the crackdown, and not the demands themselves from the UDD negotiators, they where just a lame excuse.

Finally, if I post an opinion, and you question it, it is up to me if I want to answer, if you see no answer it means that I don't want to, you can then draw any conclusion from that you want and post that and then move on, but continuing to demand answers is a waste of space, and as such will get deleted, likewise a long debate about why there is no answer, personal remarks, one liners, ect. who add nothing to the subject at hand, it's not that it's about me (or any other poster) people can post all the crap about me/others they want in the lounge or members, just not in Issues.

Now this is the final answer you get from me on this.

I was under the impression that in Issues you had to link to a valid article/website that corroborated something that you had stated. Obviously I was wrong.

Originally Posted by larvidchr

...
I also based my opinion on the known facts that where the stumbling stones in the negotiations acknowledged by both party's, 1 Suthep went to DSI (he is the boss of the DSI) the UDD wanted him to go to the normal Police, 2 the firm date of parliament dissolution.

Those two things cant possibly have been enough to make the Government choose death and mayhem, so the logic conclusion must be that there where other political motives behind the crackdown, and not the demands themselves from the UDD negotiators, they where just a lame excuse.

Finally, if I post an opinion, and you question it, it is up to me if I want to answer, if you see no answer it means that I don't want to, you can then draw any conclusion from that you want and post that and then move on, but continuing to demand answers is a waste of space, and as such will get deleted, likewise a long debate about why there is no answer, personal remarks, one liners, ect. who add nothing to the subject at hand, it's not that it's about me (or any other poster) people can post all the crap about me/others they want in the lounge or members, just not in Issues.

Now this is the final answer you get from me on this.

So for you, the two issues were Sutheps surrender and actual date of house dissolution as opposed to date of an election?

The original demand was for Suthep to surrender to answer charges that had been filed by the families killed on April 10. They had filed those charges with the DSI as it has jurisdiction. What good would it have been for Suthep to go the Police to surrender when there were no charges? It was only days later when the UDD leadership realized their mistake in saying he had to go to the police were the charges filed with the police, who responded, ok, go ahead, but we have no jurisdiction.

Actual house dissolution date versus election date. This one is even more ridiculous then the Suthep one. The constitution is very explicit on when an election must occur after house dissolution.
Section 108. The King has the prerogative to dissolve the House of Representatives for a new election of members of the House. The dissolution of the House of Representatives shall be made in the form of a Royal Decree in which the day for a new general election must be fixed within the period of not less than forty five days but not more than sixty days as from the date of the dissolution of the House of Representatives and such election day must be the same throughout the Kingdom. The dissolution of the House of Representatives may be made only once under the same circumstance.

Abhisit did state that the dissolution would happen between September 15 and the 30th. Why was that not acceptable?

You seem to think that Sutheps going the DSI rather then police and Abhisit not stating a specific date for house dissolution were excuses they used to bow to pressure to use the Army to break up the protests. My perception is the opposite, the UDD leadership was using these technicalities to not call an end to the protest.

Of course this all become moot within a day or so, once the true issue came out which was bail for the leaders and which ones would get it immediately.
TH

Originally Posted by Gallowspole

I was under the impression that in Issues you had to link to a valid article/website that corroborated something that you had stated. Obviously I was wrong.

I was under the impression that debaters should always be able to substantiate and support their opinions with supporting evidence - obviously, the more 'creative' posters on TD, who feel it is their right to just spout anything, as long as they say "my opinion", feel this common practice does not apply to them.

I think it generally speaks volumes about their credibility, or lack thereof, more than anything else.

Originally Posted by Gallowspole

I was under the impression that in Issues you had to link to a valid article/website that corroborated something that you had stated. Obviously I was wrong.

Yes or provide information as to where the information can be found if asked, which I did. You are however also allowed to express an opinion as an answer to an OP.

Originally Posted by Gallowspole

If you had continued reading the post you would've seen that I highlighted that error and corrected it.

Given I quoted it in my post, I noticed the edit.

I simply added an event timeline (linked to news items) re involvement of the PAD (yellow shirts).

To what degree the PAD influenced Abhisit is up for debate but surely Abhisit was listening to them.

UDD should have taken the offer by Abhisit to hold elections 14 November, told Thaksin to shut his mouth and gone home. Failure to keep the promise would certainly bring further larger demonstrations with much broader support.

Sorry, no link just my opinion as are all three sources in the OP.

Originally Posted by Norton

Originally Posted by Gallowspole

If you had continued reading the post you would've seen that I highlighted that error and corrected it.

Given I quoted it in my post, I noticed the edit.

I simply added an event timeline (linked to news items) re involvement of the PAD (yellow shirts).

To what degree the PAD influenced Abhisit is up for debate but surely Abhisit was listening to them.

UDD should have taken the offer by Abhisit to hold elections 14 November, told Thaksin to shut his mouth and gone home. Failure to keep the promise would certainly bring further larger demonstrations with much broader support.

Sorry, no link just my opinion as are all three sources in the OP.

I actually agree with that, seen from a western viewpoint it should have been very difficult for Abhisit to run from his world wide promoted promise, and the UDD could have walked away from Bangkok with much more public support.

Yet I also still think it is a Governments responsibility to solve conflicts rather than create them, and they should clearly have chosen to sort out the last small details rather than chose the crackdown and the resulting mayhem and deepened divides in society.

Originally Posted by larvidchr

Originally Posted by Norton

Originally Posted by Gallowspole

If you had continued reading the post you would've seen that I highlighted that error and corrected it.

Given I quoted it in my post, I noticed the edit.

I simply added an event timeline (linked to news items) re involvement of the PAD (yellow shirts).

To what degree the PAD influenced Abhisit is up for debate but surely Abhisit was listening to them.

UDD should have taken the offer by Abhisit to hold elections 14 November, told Thaksin to shut his mouth and gone home. Failure to keep the promise would certainly bring further larger demonstrations with much broader support.

Sorry, no link just my opinion as are all three sources in the OP.

I actually agree with that, seen from a western viewpoint it should have been very difficult for Abhisit to run from his world wide promoted promise, and the UDD could have walked away from Bangkok with much more public support.

Yet I also still think it is a Governments responsibility to solve conflicts rather than create them, and they should clearly have chosen to sort out the last small details rather than chose the crackdown and the resulting mayhem and deepened divides in society.

Might have been a good sign for the UDD leadership to have called for the protestors that were fighting with Army on Rama IV and Ding Daeng to knock it off and move back inside the barricades. That would have saved a number of lives and shown they were truly interested in a peaceful solution.
TH