UK academic held at airport amid blacklist controversy
Pol Maj Gen Suvitchpol Imjairat, head of Immigration at Suvarnabhumi Airport, confirmed yesterday that a British academic Wyn Ellis was being held at the airport's detention centre because his name was officially blacklisted.
He said that Ellis’ Thai wife, accompanied by a British Embassy official, was trying to get the blacklist withdrawn at the Immigration Department at Bangkok’s Soi Suan Phlu, but declined to comment further about the case.
Immigration Bureau investigation chief Pol Maj General Warawuth Thaweechaikarn could not be reached for comment as of press time last night.
An agricultural consultant for the United Nations, Ellis was stopped on arrival from Wales and taken into detention last Thursday.
Ellis has had long-running legal battles with Supachai Lorlowhakarn, former head of the National Innovation Agency (NIA), who Ellis accused of plagiarising his work. He has been detained allegedly because of a request by Supachai in 2009 for Ellis to be blacklisted.
Ellis told The Nation via phone yesterday he had been held for five days and was disappointed, as no NIA officials had shown up to help him. He said he wanted the NIA to cover the cost of a plane ticket if he is forced to leave and return. He said he was not considering suing anybody.
In a Facebook post on Sunday, Ellis said he had written to the new NIA director, Dr Pun-Arj Chairattana, pointing out that the NIA’s responsibility for this situation didn’t end with a letter revoking its original fraudulent allegation and demand for blacklisting made in 2009.
He said he had called upon the director and others to “extricate me” by appearing today at Soi Suan Phlu and submitting a letter from the NIA demanding his removal from the blacklist.
“My lawyer will be there to present evidence of Supachai’s convictions for criminal forgery and plagiarism.”
In 2008, Ellis complained to Chulalongkorn University after he noticed Supachai, who at the time headed the agency responsible for promoting and protection of intellectual property rights, had plagiarised his and others’ work in his PhD thesis.
This led to Supachai filing nine lawsuits against him but Ellis later won seven of these, while other two suits were settled out of court.
The university later stripped Supachai of his doctorate after an investigation found 80 per cent of his thesis had been taken from various sources.
Supachai also was fined and given a suspended prison term for forging Ellis’ employment contract in 2012 and Supachai was sacked by the NIA this February.
Ellis’ legal battles have become well-known in Thailand and news that he has been held at the airport after an allegedly bogus blacklist request has been reported by The Guardian and the BBC.
