{"id":50444,"date":"2025-09-30T09:32:21","date_gmt":"2025-09-30T09:32:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/?p=50444"},"modified":"2025-09-30T09:32:25","modified_gmt":"2025-09-30T09:32:25","slug":"thailand-appeals-court-upholds-royal-defamation-jail-sentence-for-lawmaker","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/?p=50444","title":{"rendered":"Thailand appeals court upholds royal defamation jail sentence for lawmaker"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

BBC: <\/p>\n\n\n\n

BANGKOK —\u00a0An appeals court in Thailand on Tuesday upheld a\u00a0two-year prison sentence<\/a>\u00a0for a lawmaker from the progressive People\u2019s Party for defaming the monarchy in a speech she made four years ago.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The court in Bangkok granted Chonthicha Jangrew\u2019s request for bail, which was set at 150,000 baht ($4,600). Chonthicha said she would appeal the ruling to the Supreme Court. If she had been denied bail, she would have been immediately removed from her position as an elected Member of Parliament.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The court\u2019s action, though expected, underlines that Thailand’s machinery of state remains deeply conservative, despite a recent change of government<\/a> and the opposition People\u2019s Party\u2019s standing as the biggest party in Parliament. Thailand\u2019s political establishment is sensitive about any perceived threats to the status of the country\u2019s monarchy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other recent appeals involving political activists have seen rulings that reversed the acquittal<\/a> of lower courts or handed down longer prison sentences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Chonthicha\u2019s case is related to a speech she gave during a 2021 political rally in which she demanded the release of all political prisoners. She was found guilty for parts of the speech alleging that the then-government, led by Prayuth Chan-ocha, changed a law to give more power to King Maha Vajiralongkorn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Chonthicha, popularly known by her nickname Lookkate, was formally sentenced last year to three years in prison but that was reduced to two years because of her cooperation with the court.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Criticism of Thailand\u2019s monarchy remains taboo and insulting or defaming key royal family members is punishable by up to 15 years in prison under the law commonly known as Article 112.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ahead of the ruling, Chonthicha told journalists that her case was important because it highlighted to Thais and the world that the law suppresses freedom of opinion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tuesday\u2019s ruling is the second recent legal setback for the 32-year-old lawmaker. Earlier this month, she was convicted in a separate case by the Bangkok Criminal Court and sentenced to two years and eight months in prison for an online post in 2020 that also concerned royal privileges.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before being elected to Parliament in 2023, Chonthicha was a high-profile activist in the youth-dominated pro-democracy movement, which demanded democratic reform of several powerful institutions, including the monarchy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BBC: BANGKOK —\u00a0An appeals court in Thailand on Tuesday upheld a\u00a0two-year prison sentence\u00a0for a lawmaker from the progressive People\u2019s Party for defaming the monarchy in a speech she made four years ago. The court in Bangkok granted Chonthicha Jangrew\u2019s request for bail, which was set at 150,000 baht ($4,600). Chonthicha said she would appeal the ruling to the Supreme Court. If she had been denied bail, she would have been immediately removed from her position as an elected Member of Parliament. The court\u2019s action, though expected, underlines that Thailand’s machinery of state remains deeply conservative, despite a recent change of government and… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":50445,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-50444","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-in-english"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50444","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=50444"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50444\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":50446,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50444\/revisions\/50446"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/50445"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=50444"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=50444"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gyalchisarshog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=50444"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}