Prayut seeks time to make Kingdom stronger, rejects outside assistance
PRIME Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha has asked for time to make Thailand stronger, while defending his government's decision to maintain martial law.
He said the country had cooperated with the global community in hundreds of international peacekeeping missions over the past several decades, and now it was time for it to take care of its own problems.
“I would like to tell the world community that my government would like to request time to do things for Thai people and Thailand, too. We [are the ones who] now have problems,” the PM said.
“We have done work in many other places. We don’t want help from others now.
“Just allow us to get stronger, and we will do our duty to the best of our ability,” he added.
Prayut also said that he listened to comments from all of the Kingdom’s allies, but that he would decide whether to believe them.
The prime minister was speaking during his weekly national broadcast as part of the TV programme “Returning Happiness to People in the Country” Friday night. He was apparently responding to the recent diplomatic drama between Thailand and the United States after Daniel Russel, the US assistant secretary of state for East Asian and Pacific affairs, called |for the lifting of martial law |and described the impeachment |of former prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra as “politically driven”.
