{"id":2008,"date":"2020-04-23T01:00:00","date_gmt":"2020-04-22T18:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/thailand-authorities-using-repressive-laws-to-intensify-crackdown-on-online-critics\/"},"modified":"2024-11-11T11:33:06","modified_gmt":"2024-11-11T04:33:06","slug":"thailand-authorities-using-repressive-laws-to-intensify-crackdown-on-online-critics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/news\/2020\/04\/thailand-authorities-using-repressive-laws-to-intensify-crackdown-on-online-critics\/","title":{"rendered":"Thailand: Authorities using repressive laws to intensify crackdown on online critics"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Thai authorities are prosecuting social media users who criticize the government and monarchy in a systematic campaign to crush dissent which is being exacerbated by new COVID-19 restrictions, Amnesty International said in a new briefing<\/a> released today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018They are always watching\u2019<\/em> shows how General Prayut Chan-O-Cha\u2019s administration has increased the use of vague or overly broad laws to bring criminal charges against dozens of peaceful critics since being elected last year. <\/p>\n\n\n

\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n

Amnesty International interviewed human rights defenders, activists, politicians, lawyers and academics for the report, which describes how the Thai government is criminalizing the right to freedom of expression in order to silence views perceived to be critical of the authorities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many of those targeted for their online posts are currently awaiting trial and could face up to five years in prison and heavy fines.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Restrictions have increased amid the COVID-19 outbreak, with General Prayut last month declaring a state of emergency that further stifles freedom of expression and peaceful assembly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Crackdown on freedom of expression online<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

After half a decade of repressive military rule following the 2014 coup, many hoped last year\u2019s elections would be a catalyst for progress on human rights. Yet one year into the premiership of General Prayut \u2013 who also fronted the previous military regime \u2013 Thailand\u2019s elected government has ramped up its efforts to muzzle online voices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Social media users told Amnesty International they had been harassed and intimidated when their posts critical of authorities went viral.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On 1 November 2019, one activist was arrested and interrogated by 10 police officers as punishment for her Twitter posts concerning the government and the monarchy, one of which got 60,000 retweets. Before deleting her account, the student tweeted: \u201cI want to warn everyone to think before you tweet and retweet. They are people who are always watching.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n

These systematic attacks on critics make a mockery of Thailand\u2019s attempts to portray itself as a country respecting human rights <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n

Amnesty International’s Clare Algar<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n

She was forced to sign a document saying she would be prosecuted if she posted similar content in the future.<\/p>\n\n\n

\u201cThese systematic attacks on human rights defenders, activists, journalists and opposition politicians make a mockery of Thailand\u2019s attempts to portray itself as a country respecting human rights and the rule of law,\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n

Exploitation of the law<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The government is using a series of repressive laws to crack down on critical voices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

These include the Computer Crimes Act<\/strong>, which was amended in 2016 to give authorities license to monitor and suppress online content and prosecute individuals for various broadly defined violations of the law.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Moreover, the overly broad Article 116 of the Thai Criminal Code provides for a penalty of up to seven years\u2019 imprisonment for acts of sedition<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition, Articles 326 to 333 of the Thai Criminal Code criminalize defamation<\/strong>, in effect empowering authorities to jail people deemed to have \u201cimpaired the reputation\u201d of public officials.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite a pause in use of the l\u00e8se majest\u00e9 law to prosecute perceived critics of the monarchy, the government has employed other laws for the same purpose. The Computer Crimes Act and Article 116 of the Criminal Code have both been used to bring criminal charges against individuals whose online posts have been deemed injurious to the monarchy and the authorities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

COVID-19 could be used to ramp up targeting of \u2018fake news\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

As part of a concerted effort to shape debate on social media, government-run Anti-Fake News Centers were launched in November 2019 to monitor online content that supposedly misleads people. Yet the government has failed to employ credible, independent third parties to factcheck online content deemed \u2018fake news\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While allegations of \u201chate speech\u201d and false information campaigns against human rights activists have been ignored, authorities have wasted no time using existing repressive laws in order to censor \u201cfalse\u201d communications related to COVID-19.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On 24 March 2020, General Prayut warned of prosecutions for \u201cabuse of social media\u201d, deepening concerns that authorities may file lawsuits against individuals for criticizing the Thai government\u2019s response to the virus.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On 26 March, the government invoked the Emergency Decree on Public Administration in Emergency Situation (2005). Under Article 9 of the 2005 Emergency Decree, officials are empowered to censor or edit information they deem to be false or distorted with the potential to create public fear or misunderstanding \u2013 with a possible penalty of up to two years in jail.<\/p>\n\n\n

\u201cThe Thai authorities must end the use of criminal laws against people who peacefully criticize them, and prevent further restrictions on the right to freedom of expression under the guise of responding to the COVID-19 pandemic,\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n

Read Full Report<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The Thai authorities are prosecuting social media users who criticize the government and monarchy in a systematic campaign to crush dissent which is being exacerbated by new COVID-19 restrictions, Amnesty International said in a new briefing released today. \u2018They are always watching\u2019 shows how General Prayut Chan-O-Cha\u2019s administration has increased the use of vague or overly broad laws […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":2009,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-noindex":"","_yoast_wpseo_meta-robots-nofollow":"","_yoast_wpseo_canonical":"","_yoast_wpseo_opengraph-title":"","_yoast_wpseo_opengraph-description":"","_yoast_wpseo_opengraph-image":"","_yoast_wpseo_opengraph-image-id":0,"_yoast_wpseo_twitter-title":"","_yoast_wpseo_twitter-description":"","_yoast_wpseo_twitter-image":"","_yoast_wpseo_twitter-image-id":0,"_hero_title":"","_hero_content":"","_hero_cta_text":"","_hero_cta_link":"","_hero_alignment":"","_hero_background":"","_hero_size":"","_hero_show":"","_hero_type":"","_hero_embed":"","_hero_video_id":0,"_hero_hide_image_caption":true,"_hero_hide_image_copyright":false,"_nav_style":"","_disable_share_icons":false,"_disable_sidebar":false,"_display_author_info":false,"_hide_featured_image":false,"_hide_featured_image_caption":true,"_maximize_post_content":false,"_reduce_content_width":false,"_sidebar_id":0,"_stretch_thumbnail":false,"byline_context":"","byline_entity":"","byline_is_author":false,"disable_related_content":false,"download_id":0,"download_text":"","show_published_date":true,"show_updated_date":true,"term_slider":"","amnesty_index_number":"","recipients":"","recipients_refresh":"","recipients_refreshed":"","amnesty_umbraco_data":"","document_ref":"","amnesty_updated":"","footnotes":""},"category":[1585],"location":[1587],"resourceType":[],"topic":[],"class_list":["post-2008","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","location-thailand"],"datePosted":"April 23, 2020","mlpRelationships":{"1":2043,"2":2008},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2008","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/14"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2008"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2008\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2009"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2008"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/category?post=2008"},{"taxonomy":"location","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/location?post=2008"},{"taxonomy":"resource-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/resourceType?post=2008"},{"taxonomy":"topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.amnesty.or.th\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/topic?post=2008"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}