Bangkok hotel attacked

[FarCenter]

BANGKOK - THE five-star Dusit Thani, a luxury hotel facing a protest site in Bangkok came under gunfire early Monday and a loud blast was heard, prompting guests to shelter in the basement, according to an AFP journalist inside.

'I was in bed. There was a big explosion very close to my room. I went out of the room, other people did too and at that moment the wall outside was hit by bullets,' said AFP photographer Pedro Ugarte.

'We received a few phone calls (from hotel staff) and they said, 'Come down, you are under attack'. Everybody is now in the basement, about 100 people,' he said by telephone from the Dusit Thani hotel where the incident occurred.

Rumours spread among guests that there were army snipers inside the 517-room hotel, which now overlooks a sprawling encampment filled with anti-government 'Red Shirts'. Violent clashes have broken out in the area between demonstrators and troops. It was unclear where the shooting that hit the hotel came from.

<SNIP>http://www.straitstimes.com/BreakingNews/SEAsia/Story/STIStory_527459.html

[Forkboy]

1. I don't think this situation is going to resolve itself nicely.

[bemildred]

2. Nope.

This one's been stewing for a long time too.

[FarCenter]

3. It looks like Thailand will have its Tiananmen Square

They will have to crush the protestors decisively to avoid a civil war.

[bemildred]

4. Thailand violence: soldier killed as death toll reaches 35

"There were two more deaths last night including a soldier and a protester," said a member of the official emergency medical centre in Bangkok, where troops and anti-government "Red Shirt" protesters are locked in a tense confrontation.

The official said the number of wounded had risen to 244. Among the wounded were six foreigners, he said.

A 31-year-old air force member was shot while on patrol in the flashpoint Silom district, on the edge of the Red Shirts' fortified encampment, the official said, adding that he died in hospital.

"We cannot retreat now," Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva said in a televised statement, encapsulating the government's all-or-nothing campaign to end protests seeking to topple his fragile, six-party coalition.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/thailand/7731894/Thailand-violence-soldier-killed-as-death-toll-reaches-35.html