Thai Junta Cries Foul Over Shinawatra İnvite

Thailand's junta has announced its outrage at an invitation by two European MPs to former Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra, asking her to come to Brussels or Strasbourg for "an exchange of views on the situation in Thailand".



 The Bangkok Post reported Thai Foreign Minister Don Pramudwinai as saying Thursday that the invitation to the European Parliament is unnatural, and it felt as if the junta had been "set up".



"If the invitation is rejected [by Thai authorities], there will [no doubt] be consequences," he added, suggesting that the two European MPs would then accuse the junta of restraining Shinawatra's freedom of movement.



The country's supreme court has banned Shinawatra from travelling overseas without authorization, as she is presently the subject of a criminal trial. 



The letter -- sent earlier this month by two German members of the European Parliament, Elmar Brok and Werner Langer -- stated "the situation [in Thailand] since the military coup is worrisome."



"Your country is still without a democratically elected legislature and will probably remain so until at least mid-201," it added.



The invitation letter also expressed "concern" for Shinawatra's retroactive impeachment by the military-appointed National Assembly last January in relation to a loss-ridden rice-subsidies scheme initiated by her government, for which she is presently facing trial.



Brok is the chairman of the European Parliament's Committee on Foreign Affairs, while Lang chairs the Committee's panel for relations with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).



Meanwhile, Sek Wannamethee -- the Thai foreign ministry spokesman -- has emphasized that the invitation letter was a "personal invitation" by the two MPs and not a formal invitation by the European Union parliament.



He added that members of the European Parliament had the right to invite whoever they wished for a discussion.



Since Shinawatra's government was overthrown in the May 22, 2014 coup - which was widely condemned by the United States, the European Union and Japan -- the ruling junta and Shinawatra have competed to court favor from the international community.



In January, the U.S. assistant secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific affairs, Daniel Russel, met Shinawatra but not junta leader-cum-prime minister General Prayuth Chan-ocha – a gesture that profoundly irritated the military government.



Shinawatra is the sister of junta nemesis Thaksin Shinawatra -- a former prime minister overthrown in a 2006 coup whose populist policies are still widely supported by the rural population. - Krung Thep