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BANGKOK: Rampaging anti-government protesters forced the closure of Thailand's main international airport on Tuesday as a second day of demonstrations in Bangkok descended into violence with 11 injured in clashes.
Thousands of supporters of the People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD) breached police lines and stormed Suvarnabhumi Airport - a major hub for millions of travellers - in their effort to pressure the premier to resign.
"I decided to shut down services after the protesters broke the door on the fourth floor of the terminal and stormed into the departure lounge. I had no alternative," airport director Saereerat Prasutanont said.
Thailand's deputy premier said the government was ready to ask the military for help, but urged calm in the kingdom amid the spiralling situation.
"I have asked the army chief and police chief to help take care of the situation," Chavarat Charnvirakul said on the state-run NBT television station.
"We will not clash. We will try to talk. The government will try to maintain security," said Chavarat, acting premier while Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat has been out of the country for an APEC summit.
Police officials said about 2,000 PAD supporters were in and around the airport while 1,000 officers stood guard but they did not attempt to intervene as the protesters milled around and bellowed into megaphones.
Hours earlier, a clash erupted on a road to another, disused air terminal where thousands of activists behind a six-month campaign to topple the government have besieged the makeshift base of Somchai.
A nurse at the Paolo Memorial Hospital near where the clashes happened said staff were treating 10 men and one woman who sustained injuries in the incident.
A senior Metropolitan police officer told AFP that the wounded were pro-government supporters, eight of whom were shot by members of the PAD. One is in a critical condition, he said.
The airport closure and clashes came a day after protests by the PAD - a loose coalition comprising royalists, Bangkok's old elite and the middle class - forced the cancellation of a parliamentary joint sitting on Monday.
The alliance has said it is in a "final battle" against the government elected in December, which it accuses of being a corrupt puppet of exiled former premier Thaksin Shinawatra. Thaksin was ousted in a 2006 coup.
Riot police have largely refused to tackle protesters amid fears of a repeat of clashes between protesters and police on October 7 that left two people dead and nearly 500 injured, the worst political violence in Thailand for 16 years.
In a statement, the PAD vowed to "close Suvarnabhumi Airport to send a final word... to Somchai and his cabinet: resign immediately and without conditions."
Somchai, who is Thaksin's brother-in-law, has rejected calls to quit.
"Anyone who wants to overthrow or resist the government is attempting a rebellion," Somchai told the Thai National News Agency.
At the three-billion-dollar Suvarnabhumi Airport, protesters ferried passengers back and forth to the terminal in pick-up trucks as taxis were not being allowed up to main terminal.
"The protesters have been very helpful - our taxi got stuck way back and the protesters' pick-up truck took us as far as they could," said 65-year-old Sandy Reid from Scotland.
Somchai's plane back from the APEC summit in Peru was due to land at an undisclosed location on Wednesday evening.
Early on Tuesday about 10,000 protesters surrounded Bangkok's old Don Muang international airport where Somchai is temporarily based. Protesters have occupied the prime minister's official office in Bangkok since August.
The PAD called this week's rallies in response to a grenade attack on Thursday that killed one protester.
Hundreds of PAD supporters also went to Thai military headquarters, but army chief General Anupong Paojinda dismissed their calls for the army to step in.
"The armed forces have agreed that a coup cannot solve our country's problems and we will try to weather the current situation and pass this critical time," Anupong told reporters.
Thaksin fled Thailand in August this year to avoid corruption charges, but has said in an interview that he wants to return to politics at home. - AFP/ir/de
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