SIGNS OF SOUTHERN HUMAN RIGHTS IMPROVEMENTS, BUT

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 BANGKOK 004201

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

DEPT FOR EAP/MLS AND DRL

E.O. 12958: DECL: 08/02/2017
TAGS: PHUM PGOV PREL KDEM ASEC TH
SUBJECT: SIGNS OF SOUTHERN HUMAN RIGHTS IMPROVEMENTS, BUT
PRISONER ABUSE ALLEGATIONS PERSIST

REF: BANGKOK 3813 (SECTARIAN TENSIONS SIMMER)

Classified By: Charge d'Affaires a.i. James F. Entwistle, reason: 1.4 (
b,d).

SUMMARY
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1. (C) During the most recent Poloff travel to the South,
many academics and civil society leaders indicated the
southern human rights picture has improved since the
September 2006 coup. Several human rights NGOs allege,
however, that some military and police officials are still
arbitrarily arresting, abusing and in some cases executing
suspected insurgents. Of note, however, is that there have
been no reports of disappearances since the September 2006
coup and high-ranking Army officials have publicly
acknowledged some detainee mistreatment while vowing to take
corrective action. Officials may also hope to create a
vacuum of support for insurgents by sending some detainees to
"reeducation camps" for several months following their
arrest, although this may backfire and worsen an already
tense situation in the troubled region. We will continue to
urge RTG officials to ensure that their counter-insurgency
efforts comply with international standards. End Summary.

HUMAN RIGHTS RESPECTED, BUT NOT UNIFORMLY
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2. (C) We traveled to Yala and Pattani in southern Thailand
on July 25 and 26 to meet government officials, academics and
civil society groups in these two restive southern border
provinces. Many academics and civil society leaders
indicated the southern human rights picture had improved
since the coup, with police and military officers no longer
causing the disappearance of suspected insurgents; this
represented one tangible and notable improvement.
Additionally, many indicated that the treatment of most of
the approximately 300 suspects arrested since June (reftel)
was on the whole satisfactory and without incident. However,
human rights activists expressed grave concern over the
arbitrary arrest and detention of some ethnic-Malay Muslims
and also blamed the security forces for the torture and
mistreatment in recent months of several detainees at the
Wiwat Santi detention facility at the Royal Thai Army's (RTA)
Region Four Ingkayut Borihan military camp in Pattani
province, as well as other detention facilities, information
these groups had received from released detainees or their
family members. Human rights NGOs also remained concerned
about the extra-judicial killing of community leaders, Muslim
religious students, and others believed by local security
officials to have connections with insurgents.

HUMAN RIGHTS ABUSES DETAILED ...
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3. (C) Representatives from the Young Muslim Lawyers
Association (YMAT),a legal aid and human rights advocacy
group in the south, provided Poloffs with the most detailed
information regarding recent alleged human rights abuses.
Claiming they were aware of at least half a dozen incidents
of detainee mistreatment, YMAT attorneys provided details of
two allegations of detainee mistreatment at the hands of the
security forces. Their accounts, however, could not be
independently verified or substantiated.


4. (C) The first case involved Sukri Adam, an ethnic-Malay
Muslim arrested in April whom security forces accused of
beheading an ethnic-Thai Buddhist. YMAT said that Sukri told
members of his family that military officials beat him with a
glass bottle, forcibly immersed his head in water, grabbed
him by the neck and raised him above the floor while he was
detained at the Ingkayut Borihan military camp. According to
YMAT, Sukri was held at the camp for ten days and military
officials only permitted Sukri's relatives to visit him for
three days before abruptly discontinuing his daily family
visitation rights.


5. (C) YMAT also alleged that security forces were

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responsible for the death of Ataree Sama-ae, a 25-year-old
resident of Hat Yai who died of severe head injuries on July
22 after leaving the Ingkayut detention facility. YMAT
attorneys could not specify whether the injuries had been
sustained after his arrival at Ingkayut or during his arrest.
Security officials allegedly transported him to Yala
hospital, approximately 30 minutes from the camp, but the
doctors were not able to save his life. YMAT attorneys said
local Army officials denied any responsibility in Sama-ae's
death. The case is currently under investigation by
higher-ranking Army officials and the National Human Rights
Commission of Thailand.


6. (C) YMAT attorneys and other rights groups claim that
while officials at Ingkayut and other regional detention
facilities permit family members and a detainee's village and
district leader to visit, the military prohibits detainees
from meeting with an attorney. Under Thai law, access to an
attorney is only guaranteed when a prisoner has been formally
charged with a crime, whereas many detainees at Ingkayut and
other detention facilities are held under an emergency decree
which permits officials to detain suspects without charge for
up to 30 days.


7. (C) The Human Rights Watch (HRW) representative in
Thailand also expressed to us concerns about an Army program
to transfer detainees from Ingkayut and other southern
detention facilities to military camps -- which government
officials call "reeducation camps" -- in Ranong, Chumporn and
Surat Thani provinces. Detainees at these camps participate
in a 4-month vocational training program after they are
released from Army detention facilities. While HRW confirmed
the assurances given to us by government officials in the
South that participation in these training programs was
optional for Ingkayut detainees, HRW believes that prisoners
from other camps in the area were threatened with prosecution
for aiding the insurgency if they refused to participate.
HRW and other groups say that the Army hopes to create a
vacuum of support for insurgents by preventing detained
individuals from promptly returning to their villages.

... WHILE MILITARY OFFICIALS ISSUE DENIALS
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8. (C) We raised these human rights concerns during our trip
to the South with RTA Major General Chamlong Bunsong, the
Chief of Staff for the Fourth Region Internal Security
Operations Command (ISOC). General Chamlong flatly denied
the allegations and claimed that "no incidents have taken
place" and that under the policy of the Prime Minister it is
"forbidden to torture." He claimed that the military was
providing training to military interrogators specifically to
ensure the humane treatment of detainees.


9. (C) When pressed, General Chamlong indicated that only
Thai-based human rights organizations would be permitted to
investigate torture allegations at Wiwat Santi -- which the
Army has renamed the "Reconciliation Promotion Center",
according to press reports -- while foreign organizations
would not be permitted to enter the facility since camp
operations are an "internal matter." General Chamlong said
that the Army permitted family members and lawyers to visit
detainees -- whom he referred to as those "invited for
interrogation."


10. (C) Over the last several weeks, an Army General serving
in the National Legislative Assembly told HRW, and the press
later quoted high-ranking Army commanders, that the military
acknowledged that some detainees had been mistreated at Wiwat
Santi. These officials publicly vowed to investigate and
take corrective action, including punishing those who may
have tortured prisoners. HRW confirms that internal
investigations of abuses have taken place at Ingkayut. HRW
added, however, that while some abusive interrogators have
been transferred, none has yet to be prosecuted.

VISIT TO INGKAYUT
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11. (C) Despite repeated requests to enter Wiwat Santi, Army
officials declared the facility "off limits" to us and only
permitted a 10-minute drive around the Ingkayut camp with a
military escort in our vehicle. Army officials also denied
requests to take photographs or meet with detainees. While
awaiting our military escort outside the camp, we observed
approximately 12 detainees, most apparently in their teens or
20's, being transported on the back of a pickup truck from
the camp's visitor center, where an estimated 100 family
members had gathered to visit them.


12. (C) One academic closely affiliated with Angkana
Neelapaijit, the wife of missing (and presumed dead) human
rights lawyer Somchai Neelapaijit, said that Angkana had
within the last several months toured the Wiwat Santi
detention facility and determined that no human rights abuses
had taken place. He added, however, that Angkana has often
exercised self censorship when criticizing government abuses,
not because she fears for her safety, but rather because she
does not want to be seen as a mouthpiece of the insurgents.

ARBITRARY ARREST AND INCENDIARY TACTICS
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13. (C) Human rights NGOs decried to us what they considered
harsh arrest tactics that were often viewed as arbitrary and
capricious, despite claims by Army officials that these were
resulting in the apprehension of insurgents. YMAT described
one case where officials arrested the four working adult
members of a Yala family, leaving the family's unemployed
women and children to fend for themselves. YMAT attorneys
also denounced recent police dragnets in which the
authorities arrested all men under the age of 40 at Bannang
Satah in Yala province and Bacho in Narathiwat province. In
these raids, YMAT said the Army's tactics of blocking the
towns' roads for up to three days were unnecessarily harsh
and inflamed tensions. Another NGO leader indicated that
resentment of the security forces often resulted from
destruction of mobile phones or the uncompensated
confiscation of property that frequently occurred as a
by-product of arrests.


14. (C) In one encounter with human rights activists, we met
Dolmeeya Bahakhiree (protect),a 24-year old Muslim whom
police picked up on a Yala street with four other youths on
June 29 and held in detention for 20 days at the Yala Police
Region Nine Forward Command. Dolmeeya said the police
accused him of being behind the bombing of a teacher in Yala
several weeks earlier, based on his possession that day of
commonly available pictures of the victims of southern
violence. While Dolmeeya indicated that the police treated
him well and permitted his family to visit him after he had
been detained for three days, his attorney was never allowed
to visit. He blamed the authorities for creating
unreasonable hardship for him and his family.

COMMENT
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15. (C) While the accounts we heard in the South of some
improvement in the overall human rights situation are
encouraging, the continued allegations of mistreatment by
Army and police officials are troubling. Although high-level
officials acknowledge that heavy-handed tactics do not serve
their own ends in quelling the insurgency and have promised
to investigate allegations of torture, regional commanders
and low-level officials often operate with impunity while the
only punishment for guilty officials -- if it is levied at
all -- is reassignment. We will continue to work closely
with human rights organizations to monitor the situation and
we will continue to encourage government officials to ensure
their counterinsurgency efforts meet internationally-accepted
human rights standards.
ENTWISTLE