NAKHON PATHOM, March 11 – The caretaker cabinet today resolved to extend the emergency decree for another three months in the violence-plagued deep South, the National Security Council (NSC) chief said here.
NSC secretary general Lt Gen Paradorn Patanatabut told reporters after the weekly caretaker cabinet meeting at the Royal Police Cadet Academy in Nakhon Pathom’s Sam Phran district that the security law extension, the 35th, will be in effect from March 20 through June 19 in the three southern border provinces of Yala, Pattani and Narathiwat.
However, Pattani’s Mae Lan district is not under the state of emergency law.
The decree was first implemented in July 2005 and has been renewed every three months since then due to the ongoing unrest.
As for the extension of emergency decree in Bangkok and adjacent areas, Gen Paradorn said that it would depend on the evaluation of the situation.
He said it was expected that the decision could be known by this week and it was likely that the emergency decree would be revoked and replaced by other law to handle the situation.
Gen Paradorn also said that he has had no chance to meet caretaker Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra after the Supreme Administrative Court ordered her government to reinstate Thawil Pliensri to his former post as National Security Souncil chief.
However, the NSC chief said, he would be working in any position as assigned by his superior.
Gen Paradorn said he believed the reinstatement could be done by 45 days in accordance with the court ruling.
