Female activists call for UN help

Female activists call for UN help

Group claims 'legal threats' used to suppress human rights work

Human rights groups have urged the United Nations to intervene over legal threats being pursued by business operators and some state agencies against women activists in Thailand in an apparent bid to silence them.

Some 53 non-governmental organisations led by a network of female human rights activists submitted an open letter to an internet-based UN meeting on businesses and human rights in Asia and the Pacific, held on June 9-11.

They called for better protection for human rights activists facing legal threats in Thailand.

Rattanamani Phonkla, a lawyer and coordinator with the Community Resource Centre Foundation, said the 53 organisations were calling on the United Nations Women's Guild (UNWG) to express a firm stance supporting their calls for better protection for human rights activists in Thailand.

The organisations also urged the UNWG to ask the government to strictly abide by the UN's 2018 recommendations on businesses and human rights, she said.

Ms Rattanamani said libel suits filed against human rights activists of both genders carried a prison sentence of between eight and 42 years and a fine of between 800,000 and 4.2 million baht.

These legal suits have been pursued over mostly petty acts such as sharing on the internet or re-tweeting messages offering moral support to migrant workers, she said.

Since 2014, at least 440 female human rights activists have faced legal suits filed against them in apparent moves to deter them from fighting to protect human rights, said Pranom Somwong, a representative of Protection International.

Most of these activists were fighting to protect poor communities in cities from being evicted, while others facing similar libel suits were working to protect land and natural resources in their own communities from businesses such as a mining companies and some state agencies, Ms Pranom said.

Such libel suits were nothing but a tactic used to silence these activists, she said.

Angkhana Neelapaijit, a former member of the National Human Rights Commission, said many of these cases were filed in lower courts in provinces far away from these activists' residences.

The intention of such moves was to make their court battles even more complicated, she said.

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