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Indonesia’s meteorological agency says a powerful earthquake has shaken western Indonesia.
The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center issued a tsunami alert for Indonesia, Malaysia, India and Thailand.
The Indonesian agency said the tremor had a magnitude of 7.6. Its epicenter was just off the coast of Sumatra
The U.S. Geological Survey put the strength at 7.9.
The shaking could be felt in high buildings in the capital, Jakarta, several hundred miles, kilometers away and in neighboring Singapore and Malaysia.
There were no immediate reports of a high waves or injuries.
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SAMUT PRAKAN: — Suvarnabhumi Airport is ready to take back domestic flights from Don Mueang Airport, according to Airports of Thailand (AoT) acting president Serirat Prasutanont.
Mr. Serirat, who is also director of Suvarnabhumi airport, said that the flight relocations will begin March 29 as the national flag carrier, Thai Airways (THAI) has announced it will move all domestic flights now operating from Don Mueang Airport back to Suvarnabhumi Airport on that day.
Many airlines have agreed to move their services back to Suvarnabhumi, but some still oppose such a decision by the government, he said.
“The AoT will try to persuade and explain them the advantages of the relocation. Suvarnabhumi Airport is not as congested as they think. We can still support more flights,” according to the acting AoT president.
In the future, Don Mueang Airport will serve only chartered flights and will become an aviation maintenance centre, Mr. Sererat said.
Mr. Serirat added that, during the Chinese New Year festival, all flights had fully resumed services at Suvarnabhumi and that the airport now welcomed about 100,000 passengers daily, a figure not much different from what it was before the airport seizure in late November, he said, serving 90,000-110,000 passengers daily.
The AoT chief said that an additional 165 flights from 21 local and international airlines have been operating during the Chinese holiday period (January 24-February 5), with about a 7,000 passenger-increase daily.
Mr. Serirat, however, admitted that the global economic slowdown has severely affected the chartered flight business, with the number of flights landing during Chinese New Year festival dropping by 50 per cent.
He hoped that the situation would gradually recover in the near future.
Here the source
Democrat Party leader Abhisit Vejjajiva has been officially voted Thailand’s 27th prime minister by a majority of 233-197 votes in Monday’s special session of the House of Representatives.
Mr. Abhisit surpassed former national police chief Pracha Promnok, Puea Pandin party leader, who won support from MPs loyal to former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, convicted of corruption charges and now a fugitive at an unknown location.
The new prime minister is expected to be formally named later in the day on Monday.
Hundreds of police were deployed outside Parliament for the session for fear of a street protest as some demonstrators gathered outside the House to protest the vote outcome.
The vote comes in the wake of months of political crisis caused by anti-government protests which saw the country’s two main airports seized last month.
Mr. Abhisit, 44, graduated from Oxford University with first-class honour in philosophy, politics and economics, and later earned a master’s degree in economics at Oxford.
He first won national election in 1992 as an MP for Bangkok at the age of 28, the only Democrat MP elected in the capital that year.
He served as government spokesman in 1992 and as Minister to the Prime Minister’s Office in the government led by the then prime minister Chuan Leekpai in 1997. Mr. Abhisit was elected Democrat party leader in 2005.
However, for some years his party has taken the role as a sole opposition party as it failed to win an outright majority in the House of Representatives.
Mr. Abhisit earlier said building national reconciliation and improving the country’s economy would be his first priority were he to be elected prime minister.
“I think it would be good if the government leader would also lead the economic team,” Mr. Abhisit said. He expressed optimism that he could improve and restore confidence among investors within two to three months.
here the source
People’s Alliance for Democracy which seized the Government House and two Bangkok airports announced an end to its protests at all spot.
PAD’s co-leaders said the decision to terminate the protests was made because they gained victory after the Constitution Court dissolved People Power Party, Matchima Tipatayai and Chart Thai parties.
The leaders took turn to declare victories on a stage at Suvarnabhumi Airport. “All people can go home now. We are the victors now. However we will be ready to come back if the country wants us too,” they told the cheering crowds.
here the source
The Constitution Court on Tuesday ruled to disband three coalition parties, People Power, Chart Thai and Matchima Thipataya, and banned the three’s party executives from electoral process for five years.
The high court held the three parties for accountability on electoral fraud involving party executives, Yongyuth Tiyapairat of People Power, Monthien Songpracha of Chart Thai and Sunthorn Wilawan of Matchima Thipataya.
In the fraud case linked to People Power Party, the high court cited the Yongyuth conviction by the Supreme Court as the ground to penalise the ruling party.
For cases linked to Chart Thai and Matchima Thipataya, it invoked the rulings by the Election Commission as the basis to punish the two parties.
The nine presiding judges reached unanimous decisions against People Power and Matchima Thipataya parties. And they formed the eight-to-one decision to punish Chart Thai.
The high court opined that the punishment by disbandment was mandatory as sanctioned by Article 237 of the Constitution and that it had no leeway to selectively punish the party executives on the individual basis.
here the source
An assailant fired a grenade into the inbound passenger terminal building of the Don Mueang Airport early Tuesday, killing one protester and injuring 22 others.
Five of them were severely injured in the attack at 00:15 am Tuesday morning.
Guards of The People’s Alliance for Democracy said they saw an attack on the Don Mueang Tollway who sped off in a vehicle to the direction of Rangsit area after the attack.
The explosion caused turmoil inside the terminal where protesters were sleeping. They woke up and ran in panic.
Protesters and PAD guards said the grenade, believed to be an M79, pieced broke a glass window pane of the terminal and exploded inside the terminal.
Two injured protesters were rushed to the General Hospital, 7 to Bhumibhol Hospital and 14 to Mongkut Watana Hospital.
Ronnachai Chaisri, 29, from Songkhla province’s Sabayoi district, died on his way to the Bhumiphol hospital.
Three severely-injured protesters at the Bhumiphol are Prasong Kongprasutr, 55, Somsak Chaisuwan 46 and Wijai Wijan, 43. They were hit by bomb shrapnel on their abdomen and received urgent surgeries to save their life.
Two injured protesters at the Central General are in critical condition. They are Phanchawee Suphatpong, 66, and Piyachart Daengpuangpaibul, 30. Phanchawee was hit at her headd while Piyachart at his knee.
Kriangkrai Piayu, a guard from Nakhon Sawan, said he saw a man walking on the Don Mueang Tollway when he heard the explosion.
The man then sped off in a vehicle.
“The attacker is very inhumane to attack the innocent people. He should have attacked us, guards, instead,” Kriangkrai said.
A protester said he saw a flash of light from the direction of the tollway and a window pane was smashed and then the explosion followed.
The attack came after the PAD deserted and ended its occupation of the Government House for security reasons, saying it would be safer for protesters to rally at the Don Mueang and Suvarnabhumi airports.
here the source
Move follows negotiations between AOT and the PAD; industry officials say loss is now ‘incalculable’
Airports of Thailand (AOT), the operator of Suvarnabhumi Airport, yesterday gave the green light to Thai Airways International and other airlines to remove a total of 88 aircraft grounded since last Tuesday.
“We’ve told every airline that they can remove their stranded aircraft if their pilots are ready,” said Serirat Pasutanond, AOT’s acting president.
The green light followed lengthy negotiations with leaders of the People’s Alliance for Democracy (PAD), who laid siege to Suvarnabhumi and Don Mueang airports, while law enforcement officials have been unable to disperse the anti-government protesters.
PAD is now under heavy pressure to alleviate the situation because 160,000 Thais and foreigners have been stranded here and abroad due to its unlawful act.
In the first positive development since the start of the airport siege on November 25, Serirat said last night that several aircraft of THAI and other airlines had already left Suvarnabhumi so that they could fly these aircraft to U-Tapao, Chiang Mai, Phuket or other regional international airports to help stranded passengers.
The airport will remain closed until 6pm today due to the presence of protesters, making it unsafe to reopen the airport.
Meanwhile, Pramong Suthiwong, chairman of Thailand’s Board of Trade, yesterday urged the government to re-open Suvarnabhumi Airport as soon as possible because the damage from its closure is now “incalculable”.
Dr Olarn Chaipravat, the deputy premier in charge of economic affairs, will today hold an urgent meeting with Pramon and other private sector executives to discuss the situation.
Leaders of the Thai Chamber of Commerce, Federation of Thai Industries, Thai Bankers Association, and Tourism Council of Thailand will also join the meeting.
The private sector said an extended closure of Suvarnabhumi and Don Mueang airports would also severely damage the country’s international reputation, while the recovery process will take more than one year.
Pornsilp Patcharinkul, a senior executive of the Board of Trade, said fresh food, orchids, electronics, jewellery and other exporters are badly hit by the airport closures with damage estimated to be around Bt3 billion per day.
Fresh fruit and vegetable exporters could not do their business because they needed to use cold storage facilities at Suvarnabhumi Airport, he said.
The private sector is not sure how long it would take to reopen the airports as a reopening will likely require certification from the international aviation body for safety reasons.
Somkiat Anuraj, vice chairman of the Board of Trade, said it may take more than one year to fix the country’s international image if the forced closure of airports lasted more than a week.
“Thai exporters will lose lots of business opportunities as buyers will turn to other countries. Unfortunately, this is happening during the peak export period as lots of orders are received in November and December,” he said.
Santi Vilassakdanont, chairman of Federation of Thai Industries, said the government may have to use part of the additional Bt100-billion fiscal budget to revive tourism, aviation and export sectors hit by airport closures.
For example, there could be special travel packages for domestic tourists to help operators in tourism, hotel, restaurant and related sectors cope with the business downturn as the number of foreign visitors is likely to drop sharply.
At this stage, foreign arrivals could have plunged to just 7-8 million next year down from the 13-14 million arrivals, resulting in a major loss of jobs in tourism and related sectors.
Tourism and other services currently account for 40 per cent of Thailand’s GDP.
Kosit Panpiemras, executive chairman of Bangkok Bank, said yesterday that if the airport closure is longer than 1-2 weeks, businesses will be hit hard.
Pairoj Vongvipanond of Dhurakij Pundit University, said Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat would likely step down or dissolve Parliament to end the crisis, while Pasuk Phongpaichit of Chulalongkorn University said there should not be another coup.
Meanwhile, Thailand Development Research Institute has projected that economic growth will be only 1.9 per cent for 2009, compared with an estimated growth of 4 per cent this year.
here the source
Foreign nations have rushed to evacuate their nationals being stranded in Thailand after anti-government protesters closed down Suvarnabhumi and Don Muang airports.
China had provided seven charter flights to repatriate its stranded nationals, believed to number 2,000-3,000 people, by Saturday and had further flights planned for Sunday, Xinhua news agency said.
The agency said the first of the flights bringing home Chinese citizens arrived in Shanghai early on Sunday.
Meanwhile Philippine President Gloria Arroyo has ordered her foreign department to account for hundreds of Filipinos among those stranded in the Thai capital and asked that they be brought home to Manila from the northern city of Chiang Mai.
Australia’s Foreign Minister Stephen Smith said his government was becoming increasingly frustrated by Thai authorities’ inability to help evacuate tourists caught up in the demonstrations which have paralysed air traffic.
“It’s very frustrating for us and it’s very frustrating for those stranded Australians,” he said.
“Some are becoming increasingly distressed, and we understand that. We’ve been working very hard putting pressure on the Thai airlines and on the Thai tourism authorities to try and get some Thai airline flights out.
He said Canberra had urged Thai airlines and tourism authorities to provide extra flights out and accommodation for the hundreds of luckless Australian visitors, but noted that “we can’t rely upon… that presenting a conclusion”.
Australian airline Qantas would provide extra flights to Thailand, but that is dependent upon getting access to the airports and getting flights in, Smith said.
Japan’s two major airlines, Japan Airlines and All Nippon Airways said Sunday they are organising flights from the U-Tapao air base to bring back tourists stranded by mass protests.
Meanwhile Spain will send three planes, two military aircraft and a chartered plane to Thailand to bring back some 300 of its citizens.
“Considering the special circumstances in Thailand, the Spanish government has decided to take action so that Spanish nationals affected by the continuing closure of the Bangkok airports can return home,” said a foreign ministry statement.
here the source
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