Thai man given 36 years in jail for Facebook posts deemed critical of monarchy

A Thai court has sentenced a man to 36 years in prison for publishing messages on social media deemed in violation of the country’s strict lese majeste and computer crimes law, legal sources reported Wednesday.

According to the NGO Thai Lawyers for Human Rights (TLHR), the man, identified only as Wut, was initially sentenced to 36 years in prison but had the sentence reduced to 18 years due to admission and cooperation with authorities.

The individual, about 51 years of age, has been detained in Minburi district, on the outskirts of Bangkok, since March 2023 and had his request for bail denied repeatedly, TLHR noted in a statement, describing him as a political prisoner.

The accusations date back to 2021, when the authorities denounced Wut for publishing a dozen entries on Facebook with content that was “insulting, slanderous, defamatory, and expressed hostility” towards the king of Thailand and other members of the royal family. Some of the images included portraits of royals in a way that led users to “understand the king, queen and royal family as not good people,” according to prosecution reports compiled by TLHR.

Wut was convicted of violating the country’s hardline lese majeste law, which punishes offenses deemed to be insulting or defaming the royal family with up to 15 years in prison, and committing computer crimes. TLHR denounced the increase in lese majeste cases in Thailand since November 2020, when the government resumed arrests and prosecutions under the law, apparently to suffocate the pro-democracy protest movement led by university students across 2020 and 2021.

According to the NGO’s most recent data, as of December 2023, at least 1,938 people have been prosecuted for political expression since July 2020, including 286 minors under 18 years of age.