Bangkok - Thai Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat on Thursday placed Bangkok's two airports under a state of emergency in a bid to clear the facilities of protestors bent on overthrowing his government. Somchai, after holding an emergency cabinet meeting in Chiang Mai, 550 kilometres north of Bangkok, ordered the police to clear Bangkok's new Suvarnabhumi International Airport and Don Muenag, the old airport, of thousands demonstrators belonging to the People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD), an anti-government movement, said government spokesman Nattawuth Saikulea.
Suvarnabhumi has been completely closed by protests since Wednesday, while Don Mueang was forced to cancel all flights Thursday, cutting the capital off from all air traffic.
"What the PAD is doing is terrorism," said Nattawuth.
Past efforts to crack down on the PAD, a loose coalition of groups fanatically opposed to the return to power of former premier Thaksin Shinawatra, have failed this year.
When former prime minister Samak Sundaravej declared a state of emergency in Bangkok four months ago after the PAD seized and occupied Government House on August 26, the measure was undermined by Army Commander-in-Chief General Anupong Paochinda who refused to use force against the protestors.
"This time it will be different because the police will be the ones responsible," said Nattawuth.
The announcement comes amid rampant rumours that the army will soon stage a coup to overthrow the government.
The political crisis has been pushed forward by the PAD, which has taken control of Bangkok's two airports, causing immense damage to the economy and cutting the capital off from air traffic.
Thailand's airport authority on Thursday closed down Bangkok's old international airport, Don Mueang, after anti-government protestors closed its new airport Suvarnabhumi Wednesday.
The PAD laid siege to Suvarnabhumi International Airport Tuesday night, succeeding in forcing the facility to cancel outgoing flights.
By Wednesday, Suvarnabhumi had also cancelled incoming flights although some were diverted to Don Mueang, which served as the capital's airport for six decades before the new airport was opened in 2006.
By Thursday, Suvarnabhumi had virtually been taken over by the PAD with only a few stranded foreign passengers spotted.
"We came to see if we could get flights out because we couldn't contact our airline by telephone," said Geline Stauder, a French tourist who had a flight of Qatar Airways. The Qatar Airways counter was deserted.
"We don't mind a one- or two-day delay, but we need to get back to work," said Stauder, who was in Thailand for a two-week vacation with her boyfriend Fabien Gand. Both are bankers.
The closures are causing Thailand's tourism industry inestimable damage.
Thai Airways International, the national carrier, is losing an estimated 500 million baht (14.5 million dollars) a day, and the kingdom stands to lose 100 billion baht (2.9 billion dollars) this peak season if the political chaos continues.
Thai AirAsia, the second largest domestic carrier, has had to cancel 106 flights, both domestic and international, in and out of Suvarnabhumi.
"I can't give an estimate of how much money is lost, but 106 flights is about 10,000 passengers a day," said Thai AirAsia spokeswoman Dutduan Jarukakul.
The Thai army has refused to crack down on the PAD, a loose coalition of disparate groups united in their hatred for former prime minister Thaksin, who was overthrown by a coup in September 2006.
On Wednesday, the army's commander-in-chief, General Anupong, appealed to the prime minister to dissolve parliament and call a snap election while demanding the PAD withdraw from Suvarnabhumi.
Both sides rejected the army appeal, leaving no end in sight to Thailand's political crisis.
The PAD is seeking a military coup, but Anupong has said a coup is no solution.
The 2006 coup failed to stop the followers of Thaksin, a former billionaire telecommunications tycoon-turned-populist politician, from returning to power in the December 2007 general election.
The current government is led by the People Power Party, which came to power on a pro-Thaksin platform and is headed by Somchai, Thaksin's brother-in-law.
