Thai anti-government protesters vowed to go ahead with a mass street rally tomorrow in defiance of an emergency decree imposed in the capital to quell nearly a month of protests demanding new elections.
A day after Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva imposed a state of emergency, more than 1,000 "red shirt" protesters scuffled with riot police outside a satellite broadcaster, known as a red shirt mouthpiece.
Thailand's government blocked opposition websites and its prime minister cancelled an overseas trip today.
Mr Abhisit, working out of a military base turned safe house, called off a one-day visit to Vietnam for a Southeast Asian summit. Tens of thousands of protesters ignored repeated orders to end a six-day siege of Bangkok's main shopping district.
"We will tear up all laws," Nattawut Saikua, a red shirt leader, told cheering supporters after calling for a march on Friday to 10 undisclosed points across Bangkok.
"We don't want to call it the final day, but if we can score a knockout, we definitely will," he said. "This is all for Abhisit to dissolve parliament." Nearly 1,000 of the supporters of ousted former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra tried to push through anti-riot forces guarding Thaicom's satellite earth station in northern Pathum Thani Province before retreating by evening.
The company, once owned by Mr Thaksin, had broadcast red shirt programmes before authorities took those off air on Thursday.
The risk of confrontation drove Thailand's benchmark stock index down 3.5 per cent to its lowest since October 15th.
Yesterday, protesters had stormed parliament, forcing officials to flee by helicopter and triggering an emergency decree that gives the military broad powers to control unrest.
Despite that decree, the red-shirted supporters of twice-elected and now fugitive former prime minister Mr Shinawatra ignored orders to leave the capital's main shopping district and promised to stage their biggest rally yet tomorrow.
Most analysts doubt the authorities will use force to remove the mostly rural and working class "red shirt" protesters who have been camped in Bangkok's shopping district since Saturday - a politically risky decision for Abhisit as his 16-month-old coalition government struggles to build support outside Bangkok.
The protest in the upmarket district of malls and luxury hotels, an area with plenty of symbolism in a country with one of Asia's largest disparities between rich and poor, has also drawn large numbers of families, complicating any crackdown.
But pressure is growing on Mr Abhisit from residents in Bangkok, a stronghold of his Democrat Party, to take decisive action to end the nearly month-long rolling protests, which began on March 14th when up to 150,000 massed in the city's old quarter.
Reuters