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| Southeast Asia |
| Thai military seeks role in constitution approval |
| 2006-09-26 |
| Thailand's ruling military, which has promised to hand over power to an interim civilian regime by early next week, announced Monday it will have a hand in approving a new permanent constitution. The military has said it will hold elections by October next year after drafting a new permanent constitution to replace the one it scrapped when it ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra last week. In addition to several specially-picked civilian bodies to draft and scrutinize the permanent constitution, the military council will also have the right to review it, said Lt. Gen. Boonsrang Niumpradit, the military's deputy supreme commander. Additional: Bangkok, 26 Sept. (AKI) - Military leaders in Thailand who took control of the country in a bloodless coup last week, said on Tuesday that they would not disband after a new prime minister is named. The members of the junta said that they had appointed themslves as advisors to any interim government. Reports on Thai media also said on Tuesday that the former head of the World Trade Organisation (WTO), Supachai Panitchpakdi, would be named new prime minister, however the leader of the coup, Gen. Sonthi Boonyaratkalin, declined to confirm the reports. Supachai, a former Thai commerce minister, is currently secretary-general of the UN conference on trade and development. The English language Thai daily, The Nation, reported that he had already agreed to take the post. On Tuesday, the military council announced on television that it was appointing several businessmen, civil servants, academics and other prominent figures to committees to deal with various issues in the country such as the economy, foreign affairs and ethics and governance. However many of those mentioned have said that they were not informed of the appointments. |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #2 If the US is hit with a devasting terrorist attack, POTUS will probably survive, but a similar thing will happen here and rightly so. |
| Posted by: Besoeker 2006-09-26 11:00 |
| #1 NEW CONSTITUTION OF THAILAND We the military... |
| Posted by: anon 2006-09-26 10:52 |