A Thai court has sentenced a citizen to 28 years in prison for posting online against the monarchy, but the court has granted the citizen’s bail.
Penalties for crimes against Thailand’s throne are harsh and human rights groups say they are abused to silence public voices.
A court in the northern city of Chiang Rai has found 29-year-old clothing merchant and activist Mongkol Terakote guilty of two separate defamation cases against the monarchy.
The citizen’s sentence was 42 years, but the court reduced the sentence to 28 years in view of his testimony.
The man’s lawyer said he would appeal the verdict, and the court granted his bail in exchange for 300,000 Thai baht ($9,100).
Mongkol is also facing a separate defamation case over online posts he made last year, for which he will face court again in March.
The 28-year prison sentence is the second-longest sentence handed down by any Thai court in a defamation case, said Sonai Pashuk, a senior researcher at the human rights group.
In 2021, a Thai court sentenced a woman to 43 years in prison for speaking out against the monarchy, an original sentence of 87 years, which was reduced to 43 years.
setTimeout(function(){
!function(f,b,e,v,n,t,s)
{if(f.fbq)return;n=f.fbq=function(){n.callMethod?
n.callMethod.apply(n,arguments):n.queue.push(arguments)};
if(!f._fbq)f._fbq=n;n.push=n;n.loaded=!0;n.version=’2.0′;
n.queue=[];t=b.createElement(e);t.async=!0;
t.src=v;s=b.getElementsByTagName(e)[0];
s.parentNode.insertBefore(t,s)}(window,document,’script’,
‘https://connect.facebook.net/en_US/fbevents.js’);
fbq(‘init’, ‘836181349842357’);
fbq(‘track’, ‘PageView’);
}, 6000);
/*setTimeout(function(){
(function (d, s, id) {
var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];
if (d.getElementById(id)) return;
js = d.createElement(s);
js.id = id;
js.src = “//connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&version=v2.11&appId=580305968816694”;
fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);
}(document, ‘script’, ‘facebook-jssdk’));
}, 4000);*/