The first of these is that there is some debate as to the importance of Thailand to the region. The Yunnan government portal is currently carrying a piece from the influential Global Times (quanqiu shibao) newspaper which believes that the crisis will have only a “minor impact on the region” due to Thailand being less important to the region than common opinion would have it.
The reason they give for this is Thailand’s lack of economic growth relative to its neighbours, which they attribute to the impact of political instability.
They also argue that the departure of Thaksin has led to a weakening in relations between Thailand and Cambodia. In spite of the apparently inflammable dealings between the two nations, they argued that things weren’t actually that bad, as Thaksin had very strong personal friendships with the Cambodian government.
This belief of the importance of individual relationships can also be seen in recent Sina pieces. Monday’s opinion piece argued that 6 major factors allowed the PAD to have “far greater impact than their small numbers”. Yet it linked 3 of these to “personal feelings” and argued that these feelings which “characterise the dispute must be put aside”.
Yesterday’s Sina piece argued that the crisis was largely due to Samak’s reputation being indistinguishable from that of Thaksin, and argued, somewhat less than coherently, that without solving this impasse it would be difficult to find any solution to the crisis. (Cutely, Sina also made hay out of the transliteration of Thaksin’s name, which can loosely be translated as “trust him”).
Yet not all of the coverage has concentrated on the personalities. Of some interest to China watchers is the occasional description of the PAD forces as the “Minmeng”. This allusion is to one of the “legally-recognised political parties of the PRC”, a fairly traditional branch of the Communist party comprised mainly of high-end intellectuals and technocrats. Pieces appearing more critical of the PAD’s actions seem more likely to use this abbreviation.
Finally, and also of some interest to China watchers, there has been some criticism of the Samak government for not coming down on the PAD protestors with greater force following the bloody clashes on the 2nd.
Lengthy recent pieces in the Xinhua news group extol the Samak government for their patience and tolerant attitude to the protests, arguing that by “after ignoring violent methods of dispersing the crowd, the bloody clashes gave the government forces the opportunity to act”. The use of only shield and baton was seen as “weak”, arguing that “the strategy was completely flaccid and… will lead to Samak suffering from even greater pressure”. Moreover, it “was tantamount to giving the PAD’s illegal activities legitimacy”.
Read into that whatever you will….