Protest co-leader Sonthiyan Chuenruthainaitham has been arrested on a charge of violating the emergency decree and will also face a charge of treason, Department of Special Investigation (DSI) chief Tarit Pengdith said on Monday.
Police step up measures at the Region 1 Border Patrol Police head office in Khlong Luang district in Pathum Thani where Sonthinyan Chuenruthainaitham is being detained. (Post Today photo)
The core member of the People's Democratic Reform Committee (PDRC) was arrested at Central Lat Phrao shopping complex on Monday on an arrest warrant approved by the court.
He is detained at the Region 1 Border Patrol Police headquarters in Pathum Thani's Khlong Luang district for seven days for interrogation, and police will then apply to the court to extend his detention for another 30 days, said Mr Tarit, who is a member of the caretaker government's Centre for Maintaining Peace and Order (CMPO).
He said Mr Sonthiyan, who operates T-News agency and satellite television station, will initially be charged with failing to comply with the emergency decree. A charge of treason would follow.
Mr Sonthiyan was being detained under tight police security, pending questioning.
PDRC co-leader Sonthiyan Chuenruthainaitham is arrested on Monday. (File photo by Thiti Wannamontha)
''His voice sounds okay. He's still in good spirits,'' Salinna Phu-iam, a host of FM101 news programmes, said after talking to him by phone after he was whisked away by police from the Central Department Store in Lat Phrao to the police camp.
Mr Sonthiyan was allowed to use his phone until he reached the police barracks.
Pol Lt Gen Winai Thongsong, assistant national police chief, led a team of police to arrest him about 1.30pm while he was eating alone at the department store before making a planned regular phone-in to a programme at the radio station.
Mr Sonthiyan is the first of 19 PDRC leaders to be apprehended by police after the Criminal Court on Feb 5 approved arrest warrants for them at the request of the DSI.
The CMPO is preparing to seek arrest warrants for a further 13 leading members of the PDRC for allegedly violating the emergency decree. If approved, this would bring the total number of warrants for protest leaders to 32.
PDRC secretary-general Suthep Thaugsuban immediately directed lawyers to help him, after learning of Mr Sonthiyan's arrest PDRC spokesman Akanat Promphan said.
Phuangthip Boonchalong, a lawyer assigned to defend Mr Sonthiyan, said she will try to bail him out but admitted it would be difficult. ''Everything is up to Tarit Pengdith,'' she said in an interview with FM101.
She said lawyers will be present when police, DSI officials and state attorneys questioned him.
Protest co-leader Sathit Wongnongtoey downplayed the arrest, saying that it was intimidation of rally leaders, because Mr Sonthiyan really faces only a charge of violating the emergency decree.
He challenged CMPO director Chalerm Yubamrung, sayinghe capture of Mr Sonthiyan could not stop the movement to oust caretaker Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra. Mr Sonthiyan would not be abandoned. The PDRC would try to bail him, he added.