US scholar in Thailand jailed pending trial on charges of insulting the monarchy

US scholar in Thailand jailed pending trial on charges of insulting the monarchy
Paul Chambers, 58, is a lecturer at Naresuan University in the northern province of Phitsanulok, Thailand. (Screengrab)
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Updated 08 April 2025
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US scholar in Thailand jailed pending trial on charges of insulting the monarchy

US scholar in Thailand jailed pending trial on charges of insulting the monarchy
  • Paul Chambers, a lecturer at Naresuan University in northern Thailand, has specialized in studying the power and influence of the military
  • Insulting the monarchy in Thailand is an offense punishable by up to 15 years in prison

BANGKOK: A US political science scholar accused by the Thai military of insulting the Southeast Asian nation’s monarchy — an offense punishable by up to 15 years in prison — was jailed on Tuesday pending trial.
Paul Chambers, a lecturer at Naresuan University in the northern province of Phitsanulok, was first summoned by police last week to hear the charges against him, including violating the Computer Crime Act, which covers online activity.
Chambers, a 58-year-old Oklahoma native with a doctorate in political science from Northern Illinois University, has studied the power and influence of the Thai military, which plays a major role in politics. It has staged 13 coups since Thailand became a constitutional monarchy in 1932, most recently 11 years ago.
Chambers reported to the police on Tuesday to formally acknowledge the charges and was then taken to a provincial court for a pretrial detention hearing, according to Thai Lawyers for Human Rights, a legal advocacy group.
The court denied Chambers release on bail, allegedly because of “the severity of potential punishment,” his status as a foreigner and the police’s objection to granting it, the lawyers group said.
The group said another request to allow bail would be filed to an appeals court on Wednesday. No trial date has been set.
The officer who answered the phone at the police station handling the case said he could not comment, and referred the matter to his chief, who did not answer a call to his phone.
It is not unusual for Thai courts to deny bail in cases of insulting the monarchy, popularly known as “112” after its article number in the criminal code.
The US-based academic freedom project Scholars at Risk said in a statement that Chambers in late 2024 made comments in a webinar about a restructuring of the military that could have been the cause of the complaint made against him by the 3rd Army Area, covering Thailand’s northern region.
However, Chambers’ wife, Napisa Waitoolkiat, dean of the faculty of social sciences at Naresuan University, said the evidence presented by the authorities was not the words of her husband but came from the website operated by ISEAS–Yusof Ishak Institute, a think tank in Singapore that broadcast the webinar.
Thai Lawyers for Human Right said the charges stemmed from the text of the invitation to the October 2024 webinar, titled “Thailand’s 2024 Military and Police Reshuffles: What Do They Mean?” and that the charge sheet contained the Thai translation of the invitation’s description of the event.
Napisa also said her husband was not summoned for questioning by police before he was presented with the warrant for his arrest, as is typical in such cases.
“It just feels like they wanted to deter Paul from doing his work and research, which often touches on topics like the economics of the Thai army,” she told The Associated Press over the phone.
Thai law envisages 3-15 years imprisonment for anyone who defames, insults or threatens the king, the queen, the heir apparent or the regent. Critics say it is among the harshest such laws anywhere and has also been used to punish critics of the government and the military.
The monarchy has long been considered a pillar of Thai society and criticizing it used to be strictly taboo. Conservative Thais, especially in the military and courts, still consider it untouchable.
However, public debate on the topic has in the past decade grown louder, particularly among young people, and student-led pro-democracy protests starting in 2020, began openly criticizing the institution. That led to vigorous prosecutions under the previously little-used law.
Thai Lawyers for Human Rights has said that since early 2020, more than 270 people — many of them student activists — have been charged with violating the law.


Families wait for word of Rohingya said to have been abandoned at sea by India

Updated 15 sec ago
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Families wait for word of Rohingya said to have been abandoned at sea by India

Families wait for word of Rohingya said to have been abandoned at sea by India
“We are helping them as human beings and we will let them go where they want if it is safe,” a spokesman for the group said
The mostly Muslim Rohingya have been persecuted in Myanmar for decades

NEW DELHI: It has been more than a week since Akbar, a Rohingya refugee in India, has heard his niece’s voice, the longest they have not spoken to each other.

She is among more than 40 Rohingya alleged by the United Nations, family and lawyers to have been forced off an Indian navy ship this month near the shores of war-torn Myanmar with only a life jacket.

“I got her out of the lion’s mouth when we escaped Myanmar almost eight years ago. And now this has happened,” Akbar, whose name has been changed to protect his identity, said of his niece, who is around 20 years old.

Myanmar’s Ba Htoo forces — opposition fighters battling the junta that took power in a 2021 coup — say the group landed on May 9 on a beach in Launglon Township near southern Dawei city, a region that regularly witnesses gunbattles and air strikes.

“We are helping them as human beings and we will let them go where they want if it is safe,” a spokesman for the group said.

The mostly Muslim Rohingya have been persecuted in Myanmar for decades, with many fleeing a 2017 military crackdown. More than a million escaped to Bangladesh, but others fled to India.

There are around 22,500 Rohingya in India registered with the United Nations refugee agency, according to the advocacy group Refugees International.

Two other Rohingya refugees told AFP their relatives were part of the group that was detained by Indian authorities.

Tom Andrews, the UN special rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar, has called the repatriation an “unconscionable” act.

Andrews said he was “deeply concerned by what appears to be a blatant disregard for the lives and safety of those who require international protection.”

New Delhi has not commented on the reports.

Family members say the group was summoned by authorities in New Delhi on May 6, allegedly to collect biometric data.

They were moved to a detention center and then to an airport outside the Indian capital.

From there they were flown to India’s Andaman and Nicobar islands, an archipelago that lies a few hundred kilometers southwest of Myanmar.

Two days after being detained, the refugees called family members back in Delhi saying they had been dropped off in the seas off Myanmar.

The Ba Htoo spokesman said one member of the group was a cancer patient, adding that the “rest of them just feel tired from the long trip.”

AFP could not independently verify the claims.

Dilwar Hussain, a New Delhi-based lawyer representing refugees from the community, said they were “concerned about the safety and well-being of these refugees.”

A petition filed in India’s Supreme Court by two refugees whose family members are among the 43 people allegedly deported said it was carried out illegally.

India is not a signatory to the UN’s 1951 Refugee Convention, which prohibits returning individuals to countries where they face harm.

However, New Delhi rights lawyer Colin Gonsalves, who has challenged the group’s detention and deportation, said India’s “constitutional laws cover protection” of the personal liberty and right to life of non-citizens.

This case is not the first to be reported.

Indian media reported this month that more than 100 Rohingya were “pushed back” across the northeastern border into Bangladesh.

India’s Hindu nationalist government has often described undocumented immigrants as “Muslim infiltrators,” accusing them of posing a security threat.

Yap Lay Sheng, from the campaign group Fortify Rights, said the deportation of the Rohingya group was a “targeted attack against anyone perceived to be Muslim outsiders.”

Ramon, another relative of one of the deported group, said his brother told him he had been verbally abused.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, Ramon said the group was “accused of being involved” in the April 22 attack targeting tourists in Indian-administered Kashmir, in which gunmen killed 26 men. The attack sparked a four-day conflict between India and Pakistan.

“My brother asked me to leave India to avoid being in a situation like his,” said Ramon, who has been in India for more than a decade.

Their mother has been inconsolable since receiving news of her son’s deportation. Ramon struggles with sleepless nights over his brother’s safety.

“They should have deported all of us and thrown us into the sea,” he said. “We would have been at peace knowing we are together.”

Germany counts on the US to pressure Russia into a ceasefire, says minister

Germany counts on the US to pressure Russia into a ceasefire, says minister
Updated 3 min 39 sec ago
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Germany counts on the US to pressure Russia into a ceasefire, says minister

Germany counts on the US to pressure Russia into a ceasefire, says minister
  • Officials in both the European Union and in the United States are ready to consider more sanctions on Moscow

BRUSSELS: Germany is still counting on the US to pile more pressure on Russia for an immediate ceasefire in its war on Ukraine, Berlin said on Tuesday, despite a call between Presidents Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin that did not yield progress in that respect.
“We have repeatedly made it clear that we expect one thing from Russia — an immediate ceasefire without preconditions,” German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul said on the sidelines of a meeting with his EU counterparts in Brussels.
“It is sobering to see that Russia has not taken this step, and we will have to react. We also expect our US allies not to tolerate this.”
He added that there was a lot of readiness both in the European Union and in the United States to consider more sanctions on Moscow but did not give any details what additional sanctions might look like.


EU seeks to relax rules on turning away asylum seekers

EU seeks to relax rules on turning away asylum seekers
Updated 28 min 46 sec ago
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EU seeks to relax rules on turning away asylum seekers

EU seeks to relax rules on turning away asylum seekers

BRUSSELS: The EU on Tuesday unveiled plans to make it easier to send asylum seekers to certain third countries, in the latest overhaul aimed at reducing migration to the bloc, sparking criticism from rights groups.
The European Commission said it proposed broadening the so-called “safe third country” concept, which allows member states to “consider an asylum application inadmissible when applicants could receive effective protection” elsewhere.
“EU countries have been under significant migratory pressure for the past decade,” said migration commissioner Magnus Brunner, describing the proposal as “another tool to help member states process asylum claims in a more efficient way.”
Brussels has been under pressure to clamp down on arrivals and facilitate deportations, following a souring of public opinion on migration that has fueled hard-right electoral gains in several member states.
Under current rules, asylum seekers can have their application rejected if they could have filed it in a “safe” third country where they have “a genuine connection.”
This is normally understood to mean a nation where the applicant has lived and worked or has family.
The commission proposal weakens such requirements to include any country that an asylum seeker has transited through on the way to Europe, as long as it is considered safe. This opens the way for failed applicants to be sent there.
The planned reform also says that the safe third country concept can be applied in absence of any connection or transit, if there is a deal between member states and a third “safe nation,” and removes the suspensive effect of appeals.
The change would significantly boost the number of those who could see their applications refused and become eligible for deportation, as many cross numerous borders on their way to Europe.
In April for example, of almost 20,000 people who reached Europe via sea from northern Africa, many came from as far away as Bangladesh, Eritrea, Pakistan and Syria, according to the EU’s border agency.
The proposal needs approval from the European Parliament and member states to become law — but has already triggered fierce criticism.
Sarah Chander, director of the Equinox Initiative for Racial Justice, said the EU was “cynically distorting the concept of ‘safety’ to meet its own repressive ends.”
“It is paving the way for migrants to be removed and deported basically anywhere, putting people in danger,” she said.


Indonesian hospital in northern Gaza nears collapse after renewed Israeli strikes

Indonesian hospital in northern Gaza nears collapse after renewed Israeli strikes
Updated 45 min 58 sec ago
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Indonesian hospital in northern Gaza nears collapse after renewed Israeli strikes

Indonesian hospital in northern Gaza nears collapse after renewed Israeli strikes
  • At least 31 people are trapped inside Indonesia Hospital as of Tuesday morning

Jakarta: The Indonesia Hospital, one of the last partially functional medical centers in northern Gaza, is nearing collapse after days of Israeli strikes on its key infrastructure, the Jakarta-based nongovernmental organization funding the facility said on Tuesday.

The hospital in Beit Lahiya, a four-story building located near the Jabalia refugee camp, was built from donations organized by the Medical Emergency Rescue Committee. 

Like other healthcare facilities in Gaza, it has been targeted by Israel’s new military onslaught on the besieged enclave, in which hundreds of people were killed in the past three days. 

“A quadcopter targeted the hospital’s generators. Two of them were destroyed in the ensuing fire. Our water supply has been disrupted, and people aren’t able to enter or exit the hospital area because there’s a risk of being shot,” Dr. Hadiki Habib, chairman of MER-C’s executive committee, told Arab News. 

At least 31 people were trapped inside the Indonesia Hospital as of Tuesday morning, including eight health workers and bedridden patients. 

The Indonesia Hospital and Al-Awda Hospital are the only two hospitals still treating patients in northern Gaza, Habib added, as Israeli attacks have forced most public hospitals in the area out of service. 

Israel launched a new ground operation, called Operation Gideon’s Chariots, across the Gaza Strip on Sunday, following over two months of total blockade on the enclave after Tel Aviv unilaterally broke a ceasefire with the Palestinian group Hamas in March. 

But Israeli forces have carried out brutal attacks in hundreds of locations across Gaza in the lead-up to the operation, killing hundreds of Palestinians. 

The latest offensive comes as Israel continues its onslaught of Gaza that began in October 2023 and has killed more than 53,400 Palestinians and wounded over 121,000 more. The deadly attacks have also pushed 2 million others to starvation after Israeli forces destroyed most of the region’s infrastructure and buildings and blocked humanitarian aid. 

It was only on Monday that Israel’s military said it allowed five aid trucks into Gaza, though according to the UN, the enclave needs at least 500 trucks of aid and commercial goods every day. 

“It’s very sad and heartbreaking. The Indonesia Hospital is barely functioning. All logistics needs have been blocked by Israel and there are threats against healthcare workers to leave and empty the facility,” Sarbini Abdul Murad, chairman of MER-C’s board of trustees in Jakarta, told Arab News.

The Indonesia Hospital was one of the first targets hit when Israel began its assault on Gaza, in which it regularly targets medical facilities.

Attacks on health centers, medical personnel and patients constitute war crimes under the 1949 Geneva Convention. 

“There is no place left that is safe from Israel’s pursuit,” Murad said. “For the sake of humanity, the international community must pressure Israel to agree to a ceasefire so that we can stop this humanitarian tragedy.”


New EU and UK sanctions target Russia’s shadow fleet of tankers illicitly transporting oil

New EU and UK sanctions target Russia’s shadow fleet of tankers illicitly transporting oil
Updated 44 min 29 sec ago
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New EU and UK sanctions target Russia’s shadow fleet of tankers illicitly transporting oil

New EU and UK sanctions target Russia’s shadow fleet of tankers illicitly transporting oil
  • The 27-nation bloc targeted 189 ships in all, and imposed asset freezes and travel bans on several officials as well as on a number of Russian companies
  • The measures were endorsed by EU foreign ministers in Brussels

BRUSSELS: The European Union on Tuesday agreed to impose fresh sanctions on Russia, notably targeting almost 200 ships from the shadow fleet illicitly transporting oil to skirt Western restrictions put in place over Moscow’s war in Ukraine.
The 27-nation bloc targeted 189 ships in all, and imposed asset freezes and travel bans on several officials as well as on a number of Russian companies. The measures were endorsed by EU foreign ministers in Brussels.
EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said that while President Vladimir “Putin feigns interest in peace, more sanctions are in the works. Russia’s actions and those who enable Russia face severe consequences.”
Russia uses its ” shadow fleet ” of ships to transport oil and gas, or to carry stolen Ukrainian grain. The EU has now targeted almost 350 of the ships in total.
The new measures are not obviously linked to Russian delays in agreeing to a ceasefire. Work on the measures began in the days after the last package was finalized three months ago.
Ukrainian officials have said that the shadow fleet involves around 500 aging ships of uncertain ownership and safety practices that are dodging sanctions and keeping the oil revenue coming.
Ratings agency S&P Global and the Kyiv School of Economics Institute, a think tank, have put the number at over 400 ships that can transport oil, or products made from crude such as diesel fuel and gasoline.
Vessels from the shadow fleet have also come under suspicion of damaging undersea cables, particularly in the Baltic Sea. Finnish police on Dec. 26 seized the Eagle S, a tanker they said was part of the dark fleet, on suspicion it used its anchor to damage the Estlink 2 undersea power cable that supplies electricity from Finland to Estonia.
The EU also said that it targeted people and companies, including an insurer, that make it possible for the shadow fleet to operate, hitting interests in the United Arab Emirates, Turkiye and Hong Kong.
In parallel, the UK targeted the shadow fleet in a raft of 100 new sanctions that it said are aimed at “ramping up pressure” on the Kremlin.
In a statement Tuesday, Britain’s Foreign Office said the sanctions will hit entities supporting Russia’s military, energy exports and information war, as well as financial institutions helping to fund its war against Ukraine.
It added that the sanctions will target the supply chains of Russian weapons, including Iskander missiles which have been fired into civilian areas in Ukraine during the war. The UK will also sanction 18 more ships in the “shadow fleet” carrying Russian oil.
“Putin’s latest strikes once again show his true colors as a warmonger,” Foreign Secretary David Lammy said. “We urge him to agree a full, unconditional ceasefire right away so there can be talks on a just and lasting peace.”
The EU has slapped several rounds of sanctions on Russia since President Vladimir Putin ordered his troops into Ukraine on Feb. 24, 2022. Around 2,400 officials and “entities” — often government agencies, banks and organizations — have been hit.