On 10 April, the father of a red shirt killed two years ago during the Abhisit Vejjajiva government crackdown on the red shirts told Prachatai that he wanted the truth about the killings to be revealed first, and reconciliation would come later.
Banjerd Fungklinchan
Therdsak Fungklinchan, 28, was shot and killed with 5 bullets in the chest at Khok Wua intersection on Ratchadamnern Rd when he was in the front row of the red shirts confronting military troops seeking to disperse the demonstrators on the night of 10 April 2010.
Prachatai met his parents after they had performed a religious ritual to commemorate their son by lighting a candle and placing food in front of their son’s photograph at the spot where he was killed.
Banjerd, the father, told Prachatai that since the death of his son he had kept thinking of him and he had always wanted the Yingluck government to proceed with the cases of the deaths of his son and others to reveal who had killed them and have the culprits punished.
He said that he supported reconciliation or amnesty, or else society could not move forward.
However, the search for the truth and culprits in the incident must be continued, he said.
He said that he would even accept an amnesty which covered all parties involved, as long as the culprits were identified.
It is just like the 14 Oct 1973 or May 1992 massacres, for which the masterminds were always granted an amnesty, he said.
‘But in the end Hell will not give an amnesty to those who order the killings of people,’ he said.
On the same day, another group of people were holding a similar ceremony to commemorate the death of Col Romklao Thuwatham, Deputy Chief of Staff of the 2nd Infantry Division, the Queen’s Royal Guard, who was killed during the crackdown two years ago.
Banjerd said that Romklao was a soldier who had to follow orders from the superiors, and his relatives had every right to hold the ceremony like anybody else.
The red shirts had to postpone a formal religious ceremony to commemorate the dead because of an important event, but he insisted on coming on the very day his son was killed, he said.
