San Francisco Frontiers - Thai ex-PM Thaksin to be released from prison next month

Thaksin, 76, has been serving a one-year prison sentence for corruption since September.

The telecoms billionaire will be freed on May 11 and will "need to comply with all conditions" until his probation ends, including wearing an electronic monitor, the department said in a statement.

His age and the fact that he had less than a year left to serve justified his early release, it added.

Thaksin's political clan has for two decades been a key foe of Thailand's pro-military, pro-royalty elite who view their populist brand as a threat to the traditional social order.

His Pheu Thai party, and its earlier iterations, was Thailand's most successful political party of the 21st century, with the Shinawatra family producing four prime ministers and drawing widespread support from the rural masses.

But Pheu Thai had its worst election result ever in February, slipping to third place and raising questions about the future of Thaksin's political machine.

Yet Pheu Thai's inclusion in the ruling coalition of conservative Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul has left open the possibility of a political comeback.

Thaksin's nephew and Pheu Thai's prime minister candidate, Yodchanan Wongsawat, was given the position of minister of higher education in Anutin's cabinet.

- Reduced prison term -

Thaksin is serving his sentence in a Bangkok prison after the Supreme Court ruled last year that he improperly served a 2023 sentence in a hospital suite rather than a cell.

He was elected prime minister in 2001 and again in 2005, and took himself into exile after his second term was cut short by a military coup.

After returning to Thailand in August 2023, he was sentenced to eight years for corruption and abuse of power.

But rather than prison, he was whisked to a private room in hospital on health grounds, his sentence was reduced to one year by royal pardon, and he was freed as part of an early release scheme for elderly prisoners.

The timing of his return and his medical transfer, which coincided with his Pheu Thai party forming a new government, had fuelled public suspicion of a backroom deal and allegations of special treatment.

The Supreme Court ruled in September that Thaksin had not been suffering from a critical health condition and his time spent in hospital could not count as time served, landing him in a prison cell to serve his one-year term.

Thaksin is one of more than 850 prisoners who were approved for early release on Wednesday, the corrections department said.

G.Collins--SFF