Thailand’s former PM Thaksin Shinawatra to serve one-year jail time period : NPR

BANGKOK — Thailand’s Supreme Court docket mentioned former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra should serve a one-year jail time period for earlier convictions on graft and abuse of energy expenses, after investigating whether or not officers had mishandled his return to Thailand in 2023 to start serving the sentences.

A choose mentioned that the enforcement of Thaksin’s penalty was not finished correctly, and subsequently his detention in a police hospital didn’t rely as serving jail time.

Following his return to Thailand after greater than a decade of dwelling in self-exile, Thaksin was despatched to a set at Bangkok’s Police Basic Hospital, reportedly for medical causes, after spending lower than a day in jail.

His eight-year sentence was then commuted to 1 yr by King Maha Vajiralongkorn, and he was launched on parole after six months within the hospital.

The circumstances raised questions on whether or not he acquired particular remedy and plenty of had been suspicious whether or not he was genuinely sick.

Earlier than the ruling, Thaksin arrived on the courtroom together with his household, together with two of his kids, Pintongta Shinawatra, and former Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra, who was faraway from her place final month after a courtroom discovered her responsible of an ethics violation for a politically compromising telephone name with Cambodian Senate President Hun Sen.

Paetongtarn spoke to reporters after the ruling, thanking the king for commuting Thaksin’s sentence. She mentioned Thaksin would stay a religious chief in Thai politics and that he at all times thinks about working for the great of the nation and Thai individuals.

“I am fearful about my father, however I am additionally proud that he has created so many historic moments for the nation,” she mentioned. “It is fairly powerful, however in fact we’re nonetheless in an excellent spirit, each my father and our household.”

Thaksin is predicted to be despatched to the Bangkok Remand Jail following the ruling.