Thailand

Book review: Duncan McCargo and Anyarat Chattharakul Future Forward: The rise and fall of a Thai political party (NIAS Press, 2020) Youth-led protests in Thailand in recent months have rocked the army-backed ruling elite which has been politically ascendant since a military coup in 2014

The latest reports from the Lower Mekong Basin are cause for growing concern that another period of drought will succeed that of 2019, affecting Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam. Expected rainfall from late May through June and July has not arrived, and the level of water flowing in the river is

Book review: Thongchai Winichakul, Moments of Silence: The Unforgetting of the October 6, 1976, Massacre in Bangkok (University of Hawaii Press, 2020) In the early hours of 6 October 1976, Thai police and right-wing thugs laid siege to Thammasat University in Bangkok, where thousands of

On 4 June, Wanchalearm Satsaksit – a self-exiled Thai political activist living in Cambodia’s capital, Phnom Penh – vanished. He was almost certainly abducted. CCTV footage shows him taken away in a black car. His sister, who was on the phone with him when he was seized, told BBC Thai that he

The main insurgent group in Thailand’s south is stopping attacks to allow a stronger response to Covid-19 in the area. But it’s unlikely to bring political settlement closer unless security forces reciprocate — something they have been loath to do in the past. On 3 April, the Barisan

It has been an unusually intense time for elections across Southeast Asia in the past year with both a stunning upset and more predictable returns of incumbents. But the striking thing from a quick tour of some of the main battlefields is how the general absence of clear policy reform debate in

With the 2019 Thai election the first since the 22 May 2014 coup and the recently-retired army general, General Prayuth Chan-ocha, as the candidate most likely to become prime minister, it was virtually inevitable that the role of the military would hover in the background of the campaign.

In 2000, China, Laos, Myanmar, and Thailand concluded an agreement to begin clearing the Mekong River of obstacles so that cargo vessels could travel from southern Yunnan to the old royal capital of Laos, Luang Prabang. Neither Cambodia nor Vietnam, the other two riverine countries, were

Thailand will assume the ASEAN Chairmanship in 2019 after the ASEAN Summit in Singapore this month. This is in keeping with Thailand’s hopes to regain its place of regional leadership. Domestic challenges have inhibited the Thai government from gaining this position in the past. But prioritising

Last month, Thailand’s military government sought the extradition of former prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra from the UK. A year ago, Yingluck had been due in court to face charges of dereliction of duty while in office. She failed to show. She was found guilty in absentia and handed a five

As prime minister, Tony Abbott once called disaster response “an antidote to pessimism”. No less than eight countries – including China, the US, South Korea, and New Zealand – had gathered in the desperate search for Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 across the vast reaches of the

Nick Bisley recently wrote in The Interpreter that mistrust between China and Australia is increasing. Could strategic trust between China and Australia improve if the two countries were to work together to solve a serious security problem? A key finding from our research into Thailand’s

Recent reports that Thailand, with Chinese money, is planning to build a new canal between the Pacific and Indian Oceans have set off a new wave of alarm bells over China’s plans to dominate the region. If – and it is a big if – the project goes ahead, it will create some big winners and

My ANU colleague Nicholas Farrelly's recent Lowy Institute Analysis 'Thailand's Triple Threat' is a sombre look at Thailand's future. He canvasses bleak scenarios, including the long-term entrenching of authoritarianism or, worse, the break-up of the kingdom. Thailand's current juncture is worrisome