re: "Govt responds to UN fears over lese majeste law" (BP, December 20, 2020)
Dear editor,
In responding to United Nations concerns that the recent use of Thailand's infamously undemocratic lèse majesté law violates basic democratic rights of good Thai citizens, when the Foreign Ministry loyally claims that, "This type of law exists in many countries to protect the dignity of royal families in a similar way a libel law does for any Thai citizen," some support really is needed. Merely claiming something is so does not make that claim credible or true, nor does it make it a relevant defence.
The claim will have some merit, not enough to justify the use of such abusive law, but at least to substantiate the insinuated accusation that Thailand merely follows international norms, if and only if the necessary supporting examples are given of other nations in the habit of imprisoning people for 15 years, or that similarly arrest 16-year-old children for wearing clothing with the wrong slogan.
When, for example, did the UK last imprison for years anyone who said much the same as Thai citizens are now saying? When did other countries impose prison sentences of years for similar acts? Absent such support, rational people will suspect that the Ministry, in doing its job of trying to make Thailand seem less stained by the acts of Thai authorities, has been tempted into promoting an arguably fake claim. And that is naughty.
Felix Qui
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The above letter to the editor is the text as submitted by Felix Qui to the Bangkok Post.
The text as edited was published in PostBag on December 22, 2020, under the title "Naughty fake claims" at https://www.bangkokpost.com/opinion/postbag/2039227/no-tests-no-problem
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