Court fines Army for detaining students over legal

Martial law allows suspects to be detained for up to seven days only. However, Ismalae The and Amizi Manak, students at Yala Rajabhat University, were arrested on January 27, 2008, and not released until February 4 the same year.
Last week, the Central Administrative Court ruled in favour of the detained students.
The Army is now obliged to pay Bt255,000 to Ismalae and Bt250,000 to Amizi, plus interest of 7.5 per cent per year, which will be calculated from January 14, 2009 – the day their complaint was filed against the Royal Thai Army and the Defence Ministry.
The compensation must be paid within 60 days of the final ruling.
“We respect the court ruling. We will learn from this mistake and seek to prevent the violation of human rights in the future,” Maj-General Akara Tiproj, spokesman for the Internal Security Operations Command (Isoc) Area 4 Forward Command, said yesterday.
Akara said the case would set a precedent for all authorities to study laws carefully and strictly comply with the legal stipulations. “We recognise the importance of human rights. Proper measures will be put in place to prevent such mistakes,” he said.
Cross Cultural Foundation director Pornpen Kongkajornkiat, who represented Ismalae and Amizi in the case, said she was gathering information to determine whether violations of laws and human rights took place in other procedures taken by officials. “We have to set the right standards,” she said.