20 years since rights lawyer Somchai disappeared, still no justice

Twenty years have passed since Somchai Neelapaijit’s departure, and Thai and international human rights activists are also waiting for fairness and the wisdom to be proven.

On Tuesday, they renewed their call for fairness.

The animal rights attorney vanished on March 12, 2004, while defending his southern Muslim consumers from rape and other human rights violations under martial law.

He was reportedly being kidnapped by authorities. No one has been held accountable for his forced removal.

Sunai Phasuk, a senior scholar on Thailand for Human Rights Watch, wrote on Twitter on Tuesday that all governments have failed to investigate Somchai’s removal.

Successful governments, including the latest PM, @Thavisin, have failed to resolve this issue. No one has been punished, according to the text.

The standard X accounts of Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin is @Thavisin&nbsp, &nbsp.

Amnesty International Thailand stated on Tuesday that the event of Somchai highlighted the inaction of government in providing the people with truth and justice.

According to Chanatip Tatiyakaroonwong, one of Amnesty International’s Regional Researchers for Thailand,” the Thai authorities have utterly failed to deliver justice, wisdom or reparations to Somchai and his family over the past 20 years.”

” This event, along with many others involving forced disappearances, highlights a deeply ingrained culture of violence in a nation that is currently attempting to join the UN Human Rights Council.”

The High Commissioner for Human Rights for the United Nations has urged officials to investigate the case and identify the perpetrators of Somchai’s removal.

In a statement released on Monday, Thailand’s authorities said they had “recognize the country’s international obligations, check this murder, and keep the perpetrators of Somchai’s enforced disappearance illegally accountable.

Somchai is married to Angkhana and has five kids.

After her father disappeared, Ms. Angkhana became a prominent animal rights advocate. She shared a Facebook photo on Saturday that shows the room where he had previously worked before being firmly removed, along with specific items.

A message that read,” Her father was made to vanish because his accomplices feared him, was posted with the picture.”