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.
US scholar in Thailand jailed pending trial on charges of insulting the monarchy
https://arab.news/yz5xq
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
‘Keep dreaming’: NATO chief says Europe can’t defend itself without US
BRUSSELS: NATO chief Mark Rutte warned Monday Europe cannot defend itself without the United States, in the face of calls for the continent to stand on its own feet after tensions over Greenland.
US President Donald Trump roiled the transatlantic alliance by threatening to seize the autonomous Danish territory — before backing off after talks with Rutte last week.
The diplomatic crisis sparked gave fresh momentum to those advocating for Europe to take a tougher line against Trump and break its military reliance on Washington.
“If anyone thinks here again, that the European Union, or Europe as a whole, can defend itself without the US — keep on dreaming. You can’t,” Rutte told lawmakers at the European Parliament.
He said that EU countries would have to double defense spending from the five percent NATO target agreed last year to 10 percent and spend “billions and billions” on building nuclear arms.
“You would lose the ultimate guarantor of our freedom, which is the US nuclear umbrella,” Rutte said. “So hey, good luck.”
The former Dutch prime minister insisted that US commitment to NATO’s Article Five mutual defense clause remained “total,” but that the United States expected European countries to keep spending more on their militaries.
“They need a secure Euro-Atlantic, and they also need a secure Europe. So the US has every interest in NATO,” he said.
The NATO head reiterated his repeated praise for Trump for pressuring reluctant European allies to step up defense spending.
He also appeared to knock back a suggestion floated by the EU’s defense commissioner Andrius Kubilius earlier this month for a possible European defense force that could replace US troops on the continent.
“It will make things more complicated. I think Putin will love it. So think again,” Rutte said.
On Greenland, Rutte said he had agreed with Trump that NATO would “take more responsibility for the defense of the Arctic,” but it was up to Greenlandic and Danish authorities to negotiate over US presence on the island.
“I have no mandate to negotiate on behalf of Denmark, so I didn’t, and I will not,” he said.
Rutte reiterated that he had stressed to Trump the cost paid by NATO allies in Afghanistan after the US leader caused outrage by playing down their contribution.
“For every two American soldiers who paid the ultimate price, one soldier of an ally or a partner, a NATO ally or a partner country, did not return home,” he said.
“I know that America greatly appreciates all the efforts.”
