No re-imposition of emergency rule in Chiang Mai: Thai Army chief

The emergency decree will not be reimposed in Chiang Mai and no violence is expected during the event to commemorate the fourth anniversary of the 2006 coup d' etat, said the national army chief on Monday morning.

"Declaring a state of emergency in Chiang Mai again will affect the people's daily life," Gen. Anupong Paojinda said following a grenade attack Sunday outside a company in the province, according to Bangkok Post online.

The bombing, reportedly targeting the company owned by the Bhumjaithai power Newin Chidchob's father-in-law, has prompted renewed calls for the government to reimpose the emergency decree in the province.

The state of emergency was imposed in Bangkok and its surrounding provinces on April 7, followed by the imposition of this special security law in the northern and northeastern provinces, after the red-shirts demonstrations in some areas turned into violent.

Chiang Mai, deemed as one of the strongholds for the anti- government movement red-shirts as well as for the self-exiled ex- premier Thaksin Shinawatra, had been under the emergency rule till Aug. 16.

On the red-shirts' plan to organize an event to mark the Sept. 19 coup this Sunday, the army chief said he believed no violence would take place.

"The red-shirts only want to express their political views, which is legitimate, but they must abide by the law at all times," he said.

The red-shirts, many of them supporters of Thaksin, scheduled to hold demonstrations both in Bangkok and in Chiang Mai this Sunday.

The last large-scaled rally by them in Bangkok from mid-March to mid-May left 91 people dead and nearly 1,900 injured before the protestors were dispersed by the army.

Source: Xinhua