The Governing Council of the Inter-Parliamentary Union,

Having before it the case of 180 former members of the Parliament of Thailand, which has been the subject of a study and report of the Committee on the Human Rights of Parliamentarians following the Procedure for the treatment by the Inter-Parliamentary Union of communications concerning violations of the human rights of members of parliament,

Taking note of the report of the Committee on the Human Rights of Parliamentarians, which contains a detailed outline of the case (CL/188/13(b)-R.1),

Considering the following information on file as provided by the source:

I.        The dissolution of the political parties to which the former MPs concerned belonged

• In September 2006, while the then Prime Minister, Mr. Thaksin Shinawatra, was abroad, the military took control of the country; an Administrative Reform Council under the Democratic System, later changed into Council for Democratic Reform (CDR), was established with General Sonthi acting as its official leader; it abrogated the 1997 Constitution and abolished, among other institutions, the Senate, the House of Representatives and the Constitutional Court; in October 2006, an Interim Constitution was promulgated and established a National Legislative Assembly, to replace the former Senate and House of Representatives, its members being appointed by the Council for National Security (CNS); in addition, the CNS appointed a 35-member Constitution Drafting Assembly; the draft constitution prepared by that Assembly was adopted in August 2007 by referendum;

• The Interim Constitution established a Constitutional Tribunal, composed of nine members appointed by the CNS; on 30 May 2007 that Tribunal dissolved Prime Minister Shinawatra’s Thai Rak Thai Party, which had won elections in 2001, 2005 and 2006 (the latter being invalidated by the Constitutional Court) and banned the party’s entire executive committee, including 111 members of parliament, from participation in politics for five years; according to the source, the decision was ostensibly based upon a finding that two executive members of the Thai Rak Thai Party were guilty of bribery in the April 2006 elections; the source points out that, on the day of the ruling, the Constitutional Tribunal cleared the (then opposition) Democrat Party of charges, reportedly considering that the party should not be held responsible for the action of its officials;

• Following the dissolution, former Thai Rak Thai members founded the People Power Party (PPP); in the December 2007 elections, the party won 233 out of 480 seats and set up a coalition government under Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej; on 2 December 2008, the Constitutional Tribunal decided to dissolve the PPP and its coalition partners Chart Thai and Matchima Thipathai parties; according to the source, the PPP was dissolved and its executive committee, including the parliamentarians concerned, disqualified on the basis of violations which former House Speaker Yongyuth Tiyaparat was alleged to have committed in the run-up to the 2007 general election; as regards its two coalition partners, a member each of their executive committees was found guilty of vote-buying; following their dissolution, the Democrat Party established a coalition government with Mr. Abhisit Vejjajiva as Prime Minister.

• he source affirms that the dissolution and the debarment from political office is based on the notion of “collective guilt”, which cannot be used to justify the dissolution of a political party and the punishment of persons for crimes committed by others without their knowledge and, still less, complicity;

• The source stresses that the military authorities pushed through the creation of a legal basis for these steps by extending the existing, already far-reaching, provisions on party dissolution, under the 1998 Organic Act on Political Parties, with the adoption of Announcement 27 by the CDR on 21 September 2006 and the 2007 Constitution; Announcement 27 empowered the Constitutional Tribunal to revoke for five years the electoral rights of members of the executive committee of any party which had been dissolved for committing an act prohibited under the Organic Act, even if the alleged misconduct had occurred before the military takeover in 2006; this meant that although the prohibited act still had to be committed by the "party", there were penalties for the entire membership of the executive committee; Section 237 of that Constitution, moreover, gives the Constitutional Tribunal the option to dissolve any party whose executive committee included at least one politician found guilty of fraud by the Election Commission of Thailand and, concurrently with the dissolution, ban the party’s entire executive committee from voting and holding elective office for a period of five years;

• The source affirms that the Constitutional Tribunal which adopted the two decisions was not competent since its members had been hand-picked by the military authorities that took over the country in September 2006 and showed bias by not applying the same standards in its adjudication of cases that could have potentially led to the dissolution of the Democrat Party and smaller parties that support the Government,

Considering that, in July 2009, a parliamentary committee appointed to explore reforms to the Constitution reportedly did propose amending Section 237 by deleting the provisions allowing the Constitutional Tribunal to disenfranchise party executives not accused of wrongdoing; the source states that similar proposals were put forward by a government-appointed "Constitutional Reform Committee" in October 2010, although none of the proposals were pushed through in the National Assembly,

Bearing in mind that Thailand is a party to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which in its Articles 22 and 25 protects the right to freedom of association and the right to take part directly in the conduct of public affairs,

1. Thanks the leader and the other members of the Thai delegation for their cooperation and for the information provided;

2. Is deeply concerned that 175 of the parliamentarians in question had their parliamentary mandates revoked and their political rights suspended in connection with alleged offences for which they were not responsible and on the basis of legal provisions that were applied retroactively;

3. Notes that the adoption of Announcement 27 and Section 237 of the Constitution and the decisions of the Constitutional Tribunal to dissolve their parties and disbar their executive members have the effect of removing a sizeable segment of the national political elite from the political process;

4. Expresses concern that the Constitutional Tribunal's decisions have direct consequences not only for the political parties and the individuals concerned but also for the electorate they represent, accounting for a significant part of the Thai population, which, as a result of their disbarment for five years, has been deprived of its voice in Parliament and of a free choice to elect its representatives in the next elections;

5. Believes that this situation can but seriously compromise the political process in Thailand and, in view of the legislative elections scheduled for mid-2011, calls on the competent Thai authorities, including the Parliament, to do everything possible to lend fresh impetus in support of earlier initiatives to address the concerns arising from Section 237 of the Constitution and to look at ways to have the disbarment of the parliamentarians reconsidered;

6. Requests the Secretary General to convey this resolution to the competent authorities and to the source;

7. the Committee to continue examining this case and report to it at its next session, to be held on the occasion of the 125th IPU Assembly (October 2011).

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