Caretaker PM in Thai North, anti-government rallies continue in Bangkok

CHIANG MAI, THAILAND, December 12 (TNA) - Caretaker Prime Minister and Defence Minister Yingluck Shinawatra is visiting Chiang Mai Province in the Thai North, her home province, where she has instructed local authorities to prevent haze from affecting tourism in the northern region. Yingluck, who attended the official opening ceremony of the 4th Thai-Lao Friendship Bridge in adjancent Chiang Rai Province on Wednesday, chaired a meeting on solutions to haze in 10 provinces in the Upper Thai North on Thursday morning. Also present at the meeting were Caretaker Deputy Prime Minister Plodprasop Suraswadi, Caretaker Deputy Prime Minister and Agriculture and Cooperatives Minister Yukol Limlaemthong, Caretaker Interior Minister Charupong Ruangsuwan, governors of the 10 northern provinces and heads of local government agencies. The caretaker interior minister acknowledged that forest fires and haze always affects the Thai North from every December-January. According to the caretaker interior minister, the prime minister has ordered serious solutions and she is supervising the issue directly, as she does not want the problem to affect public health and tourism in the Thai North. Police, including plain-clothes ones, are securing the caretaker prime minister’s trip in the Thai North. Meanwhile, anti-government demonstrations, led by the People’s Democratic Reform Committee (PDRC), have continued in Bangkok, while Royal Thai Armed Forces Chiefs have reportedly turned down a request by PDRC secretary-general Suthep Thaugsuban, a former Thai deputy prime minister of the Democrat Party, for a meeting to explain the movements of his group. A group of protesters rallying in front of Bangkok's Government House reportedly tried to break into the compound of the government seat on Thursday morning.(TNA)