A Thai court issued orders on Tuesday to arrest former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra on terrorism charges, accusing him of helping to fund two months of anti-government riots.
The court says there is enough evidence to believe that Thaksin was the mastermind of weeks of anti-government riots that began in April and left 88 people dead and 1,400 wounded.
Government officials say Thaksin contributed millions of dollars toward the 10 weeks of protests and is believed to have organized the smuggling of arms and fighters from Cambodia.
Arresting Shinawatra may not be easy. It's believed the telecom tycoon has resided in Dubai since his ouster in a coup in 2006, but he keeps his location secret. He was last believed to be in France for the Cannes film festival.
Thai prosecutors and the Foreign Ministry said they would launch a global hunt for Thaksin. If he is captured and convicted, he could be sentenced to death.
Thaksin fled Thailand following a corruption conviction in 2008. In February, Thailand's top court seized US$1.4 billion of his assets, saying it had been accrued through abuse of power.
Thaksin denied Tuesday's terrorism charges on his Twitter page, http://twitter.com/thaksinlive.
"As a prime minister who won two landslide election victories, I was ousted in a coup," Thaksin wrote in Thai. "As I was fighting peacefully for justice for the return of my robbed assets, I was slapped with terrorism charges."
Thaksin's London-based lawyer, Robert Amsterdam, said the government "has perverted justice through the laying of a charge that violates logic, law and any claim of hopes for reconciliation."
Thailand's Red Shirt protesters, largely comprising the urban and rural poor, have mostly supported Thaksin in their protests. To many of them, Thaksin is a hero whose populist policies during his 2001-2006 reign benefited them.
The Red Shirts, feeling disenfranchised by a Bangkok elite supported by the military, have accused Prime Minister Abhisit of coming to power illegitimately with the help of back-room deals and military pressure. They've demanded Abhisit quit and call new elections.
Their anger began to boil into violence in April and came to a peak last week, when almost 40 buildings were set on fire during a military crackdown that forced the surrender of more than a dozen protest leaders.
Deputy Prime Minister Suthep Thaugsuban is warning that the movement behind the protests is still a threat. He said a night curfew would stay in force until May 29. Suthep said the curfew in Bangkok and 23 provinces was necessary to prevent more unrest.
