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BANGKOK - Thailand plans to beef up security in the capital ahead of a crucial ruling on whether the kingdom's two largest political parties should be dissolved, Bangkok police said Sunday.
About 500 police will be deployed on Wednesday at the court where judges will announce the fate of Thai Rak Thai (TRT), the party formed by the ousted prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, and the Democrat Party, Thailand's oldest party.
The parties face a slew of electoral fraud charges related to annulled elections in April last year, and many people are concerned that a verdict banning one or both of the parties could provoke unrest and clashes.
Colonel Sansern Kaewkamnerd, a spokesman for the military which seized power in a coup last September, said police would work with the army and Bangkok security staff to monitor both the capital and the countryside.
He said the army would set up checkpoints on roads from the north, a stronghold of Thaksin and his TRT party.
"If we find that people are coming to Bangkok, we will check them and stop them from bringing weapons, but we will not stop them from coming to assemble," Sansern said Sunday.
Acting national police chief Sereepisut Taemeeyaves told AFP last week that they would scupper any plans to bring elephants to the capital, after rumours that protesters would bring 99 pachyderms from the north.
"The law already bans elephants from entering the city, and those who bring them to incite chaos will face prosecution," he said. "Police will not let them in to avert clashes."
Anti-military groups with links to Thaksin have said they plan to rally, but have given no further details.
One senior TRT member from the northeast has urged Bangkok taxi drivers to switch on their headlights and bedeck their cabs with red ribbons to protest the possible dissolution of the parties.
In a rare speech last week amid reports of possible unrest, Thailand's revered King Bhumibol Adulyadej told senior judges that whatever the verdict, it would likely cause trouble.
Police and the military have played down talk of any unrest, while the leaders of both the TRT and the Democrat Party have stressed that they would accept the verdict and discourage their supporters from protesting.
Police Major General Vichien Pojaphosri said that the 500 police at the courthouse would be equipped with only shields and batons, and said any opposing groups of protesters would be kept apart.
"We don't expect anything seriously after the judgement is read," he said, adding that the verdicts would be televised so there would be no need for supporters of the parties to go to the court.
The allegations of electoral fraud stem from snap polls held on April 2 last year after months of street protests against Thaksin.
If the constitution tribunal finds one or both parties guilty of vote fraud, it can dissolve them and ban the party leaders from politics for five years. –AFP/ir
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