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BANGKOK - A court sentenced the leader of Thailand's "Yellow Shirt" protesters to two years in jail for defamation Thursday, but granted him bail while he prepares an appeal, lawyers and officials said.
Media mogul Sondhi Limthongkul, whose royalist movement led a crippling blockade of Bangkok's airports last year, was convicted over remarks that he made against an ally of fugitive former premier Thaksin Shinawatra.
The case centred on comments Sondhi made in a televised speech in 2008 accusing Thaksin's friend, former central bank governor and deputy prime minister Pridiyathorn Devakula, of covering up Thaksin's wrongdoings.
"The judges ruled that Sondhi was guilty of intentional defamation of the plaintiff, and that he had repeatedly committed similar offences, so the sentence must be implemented immediately," a court official said.
The court later freed Sondhi on 200,000 baht (5,700 US dollars) bail, said his lawyer Suwat Apaipak.
"Sondhi will file an appeal within 30 days as allowed under the law. He has already left the court after his bail was approved," Suwat said.
Sondhi survived an assassination attempt in April that he blamed on elements in the security forces, the latest incident in his central role in Thailand's political turmoil over the last four years.
He founded the yellow-clad People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD), which held mass protests preceding the September 2006 coup that ousted billionaire Thaksin as prime minister.
The movement took to the streets again in 2008 to oppose a government formed by Thaksin's allies, eventually forcing them from power in December through the economically-devastating airport siege.
Sondhi made the comments about Pridiyathorn in January 2008 on his private cable television station, ASTV. The editor-in-chief was given a one-year suspended jail term and fined 30,000 baht on Thursday.
Thailand remains riven by divisions between supporters and detractors of Thaksin, mirroring the rift between the palace, military and Bangkok's urban elite who loathe him and the rural north where he is adored.
Pro-Thaksin "Red Shirt" protesters are set to hold a mass rally in Bangkok on September 19, the third anniversary of the coup. Thaksin fled the kingdom last August to avoid a two-year jail term for corruption.
- AFP/ir
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