Harry’s Tears

He looked more than disturbed from behind those bars, Harry Nicolaides, the 41-year-old Greek-Australian writer who some years ago wrote a sentence he today deeply regrets. A Thai court sentenced the writer – who’s not even a writer as a quick online-search reveals – to three years in jail after pleading guilty to lèse majesté charges.

Harry had printed a few dozen copies of an obscure book and sold not even a handful of them – with the one sentence in it. On the day of his conviction he said, from behind bars: “This is an Alice in Wonderland experience. I really believe that I am going to wake up and all of you will be gone,” Nicolaides told reporters. “I would like to apologize.”

“This can’t be real. It feels like a bad dream,” he went on, choking back tears. “I respect the king of Thailand. I was aware there were obscure laws but I didn’t think they would apply to me.” During his time in jail he had endured “unspeakable suffering,” he said, but would not elaborate. Chained to a cell mate, he was shoved back to jail. Drawing once again the attention of the world’s media to a Thailand that is not that easily understood.

Harry still does not know who filed the complaint against him. Judging from other cases he can expect a royal pardon in some months – as Swiss national Oliver Jufer was granted after having been convicted to ten years in jail for an alcohol intoxication that led to some actions he later deeply regretted as well. Nevertheless there is a new angst in the kingdom. I just got an email from a regular reader:

Fearing that vague words could be misconstrued and people posting on websites could have their IP addresses farmed by Thailand’s relevant authorities.

IP aranoia.

As a rule of thumb we always thought that laws were applied more laxly under a Democrat-led government. Not any longer. But why worry. The rules are as clear as alphabet soup.

When in Rome, do as the Romans do.

Thais will make sure this always is and will be the Land of the Free.

While this is and remains a purely Thai affair – as much as Thai politics remain a purely internal Thai affair. In the West you can become a leading politician even as an immigrant. You may be born in another country with foreign parents but still become a fully naturalized citizen. Not here. Even if you get the Thai passport. Imagine a luk krueng politician. Am not aware of any.

I’m nevertheless astonished – doesn’t the honorable Bangkok Post moderate comments?

(Addendum: The Post’s comments are taken down as of the day after)

Photos via daylife




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January 19, 2009 | Filed Under Being Farang, Politics, Society 

Comments

17 Responses to “Harry’s Tears”

  1. David Brown on January 20th, 2009 9.30 am

    Note that Thai law also prohibits:

    “Section 133: Whoever, defaming, insulting or threatening the Sovereign, Queen, Consort, Heir-Apparent or Head of a Foreign State, shall be imprisoned from one to seven years or fined from two thousand to fourteen thousand baht, or both.”

    So, also be careful what you say about Kevin Rudd, Putin, the president of Kazakhstan etc. while in Thailand.

    Unless you are a member of the Thai ruling elite or its supporters (pro tem) in which case you seem to be allowed to say anything you like about anyone!

  2. thy on January 20th, 2009 10.47 am

    Although not a politican Giles Ji Ungkaporn is luk kreung, but we will see what happens to him shortly (more lèse majesté madness).

    According to Reporters Without Borders Harry’s case is all because of just 3 sentences in his book – and this is the scary thing – the charge is based on the THAI TRANSLATION. Nobody knows if it is even an accurate translation because the judge declared that nobody was allowed to repeat the offending words in court. What chance of a fair trial does that leave?

    How much worse is this going to get before it gets better?

  3. PD on January 20th, 2009 12.08 pm

    Hi,

    Sam, or Yuranun Pamornmontri, is half German I believe.

  4. A.F. on January 20th, 2009 3.15 pm

    Move over Schapelle Corby, Australia has a new celebrity criminal! Let the liberal fawning and sighing commence!

    If you read the so-called 103 (or 107) words in the original English, it’s very clear who he’s talking about and he makes the error of repeating rumor regarding the kind of acts that person might be capable of, including multiple homicides.

    Harry has only Harry to blame and is damned lucky to have gotten just 3 years. More fool him thinking he could write something so offensive and then stroll back into the Kingdom and avoid facing the music.

    As to your reader’s comments, Dan, he’s quite right that virtually anything you read or write on the internet in Thailand can be traced back to the source unless you take precautions. It’s trivially simple, if you’ve got The Power, to look for all IP addresses in the CAT or ISP’s proxy cache which accessed a given site (especially those doing POST operations) and then trace them back to a phone number and address through the ISP and phone company records.

    That which requires a plethora of search warrants in the West needs only a few phone calls here, if you’ve got the right surname or enough gold braid on your hat.

    He’s completely wrong on the matter of Thai citizenship however. One high profile example is Bill Heinecke, chairman of the Minor Food group and other enterprises, and there are many others. These folks get a Thai I.D. card (albeit with a special code) and passport, the write to vote, the obligation of military service if otherwise qualified and so on.

    -A.F.

  5. BangkokDan on January 20th, 2009 3.22 pm

    Don’t misquote me A.F.

    To get the Thai passport is not a problem, you just follow the procedure.

    Naturalization is not the issue here.

    But to become an “integrated” naturalized Thai who’s able to assume a higher office, such as a parliamentary seat, that’s the sheer impossibility I’m talking about.

    BangkokDan

  6. 'Pong on January 20th, 2009 3.23 pm

    I see that the law becomes more and more of a witch hunt process than to conserve the integrity of the monarchy.

    Regarding Ms. Corby, Harry is way less known to Australian public than her story, the Bali Nine and Michelle Leslie. I speculate because of some reasons Australian media, especially from commercial news network television, do not dig into it. There is no moral lesson for the audience. No drug in the news to sell here.

  7. A.F. on January 20th, 2009 5.43 pm

    Dan, it wasn’t my intention to misquote you. But the way you wrote that bit it was impossible to tell where your reader’s remarks let off and your own began.

    It doesn’t relate solely to passports of course, and I think my comment makes that quite clear. There is no technical statutory impediment that I know of for a naturalized Thai citizen to be disqualified for all elected offices. So some prominent positions may be out of reach here but so what? Foreigners are barred from the presidency in the USA and other Western countries have similar laws.

    -A.F.

  8. BangkokDan on January 20th, 2009 6.07 pm

    The thought behind “politically active naturalized” Thais would be, A.F., to pursue a slightly different, if not “liberal” agenda. But naturalized Thais seem to be silently barred from the executive and legislature – or none has tried so far? A healthy blood replacement, I would assume.

    That’s why we as “intruders” – doesn’t matter how long you live here and how Thai you become – have to consider and respect this topic’s issue at stake as a purely internal Thai matter.

    BangkokDan

  9. Pete, FrogBlogger on January 20th, 2009 6.17 pm

    Can’t see any comments on that Bangkok Post url Dan – am I missing something?

    Ironic though, when you think of all the massive amounts of negative press Thailand receives when this sort of thing happens. Otherwise offences of this type would just never get one iota of publicity.

    I would bet many tourists are put off from travelling to Thailand because of the fear factor alone. Who knows what you could end up being accused of. Those hesitating because of recent events especially.

    PS – did a trackback to you yesterday, any reason why it has not appeared in your Recent Trackbacks list? Don’t know how it works, so may have done something wrong somewhere …

  10. BangkokDan on January 20th, 2009 6.26 pm

    Hmm, here we go. Yesterday within a few hours several dozen comments were posted. Completely unedited, it seemed.

    The Post obviously took them down.

    BangkokDan

  11. whoopla on January 20th, 2009 8.07 pm

    Tears for Thailand as it enshrouds itself in denial and fear as the world celebrates a new leader who portends light and hope …

  12. Dudeist on January 23rd, 2009 9.04 am

    In the U.K. if you are legally in the country and live there for two years you can vote in local elections. After seven years you can apply for citizenship. We’ve had ministers, royalty and senior figures at every level who come from immigrant stock. Thailand can’t even charge “foreigners” the same price so the notion put out by A.F. that some parity exists is just total utter BS. If Bill Heinecke is the best example you can come up then I think we should all just dismiss your argument.

    My view is if you pay tax over an extended period and can show a commitment to a community you should have the right to vote. I know of very straight ex-pats in Thailand who are married, have kids, have run successful businesses for years, employing dozens of Thais and showing healthy profits and they still have to do ridiculous border runs.

    But then there is an inherent racism in Thailand that is never addressed at an institutional level. This is even directed at Thais such as “brown” skinned Isaan people, the hill peoples denied I.D. cards (despite some having been inside Thailand’s borders for generations) and extends to Thailand’s neighbors such as Burmese refugees (ruthlessly exploited and murdered) etc. etc.

    Thailand is presently being revealed as the tinpot place it actually is at the moment.

    Harry is just a fall guy designed to send a message out to the international press who are based in Bangkok.

    But, like much else in the thinking of Thailand’s elite, this present clampdown reveals a weird 1980s mindset. The Cold War is over and global media, via such things as blogs, twitter etc. etc. means that open debate is actually impossible to control.

    And back to Harry – imagine if the Thai authorities had ignored that book? It would’ve fallen into total obscurity and Nicolaides would have never been heard of.

    In stead, by operating in such a paranoid manner, the offending paragraph of Harry’s book has been read by millions across the world, he is the subject of numerous newspaper editorials and, thanks to this reaction, a “celebrity criminal” has been created. In this instance, the application of the lèse majesté law has been totally and utterly self-defeating.

    The only positive outcome for the elite is that foreign writers, journalists and bloggers based in Thailand are now running scared. But journalists tend to have very long memories and tend to show a lot of solidarity – the message is that Thailand is moving away from democracy and freedom.

  13. ATP on January 23rd, 2009 10.29 am

    I agree with Dudeist. As a Thai, I’m ashamed for our country. However, a good outcome of this whole affair is to highlight the nature of LM. If only more Thais were willing to have their minds opened.

  14. puppetmall on January 23rd, 2009 5.33 pm

    Ultranationalism (…) at cinemas: The association of Thai cinema distributors are clearly on a bent to promote their own desultory films, as you can see what they import is rubbish, just in case people are able to compare … thank god the pirated DVD producers are increasingly connoisseurs of world class films, they put the legitimate distributors to shame, and also provide for a safe arrest-free watching at home. I shall not be entering a Thai cinema any time soon …

  15. BangkokDan on January 23rd, 2009 8.57 pm

    I had to delete some comments – not because I want to, but because I had to.

    Please don’t let me close this thread for comments.

    As for satire I’m not able to publish … sorry folks, satire is not understood in Thailand.

    BangkokDan

  16. hippo on January 24th, 2009 7.07 am

    The laws seemed to protect the elite. Basically, letting the super elite getting away from breaking the laws. It’s sad.

  17. Harry's Tears « Asian Correspondent on October 22nd, 2009 3.31 pm

    [...] Bangkok has a few pictures and in this instance it is really true that a picture paints a thousand [...]

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