The Nation in its article, “53 countries back election: Surapong,” reports:
Caretaker Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Surapong Tovichakchaikul said Sunday that 53 countries and two international organisations have issued statements backing Thailand’s election on February 2.
They believed that the election would be an internationally-accepted means to return the power to people, he said.
The latest statements were issued by Colombia and Mexico, praising for the election which would promote public participation and benefit Thailand. They will closely monitor the situation in Thailand and hope for a peaceful, democratic and constitutional solution, he said.
Of course, readers might recall another infamous use of “appealing to authority,” and in particular, appealing to “international consensus” that was used by America’s Bush administration to justify the criminal invasion and occupation of Iraq in 2003. Called the “Coalition of the Willing,” it included an impressive 45+ nations that would not only back the act of aggression, but would actually provide troops as well, including Thailand under Thaksin Shinawatra.
In CNN’s 2002 article, “Bush: Join ‘coalition of willing’,” it reported:
George W. Bush has said the United States will lead a “coalition of the willing” if the Iraqi president chooses not to give up his weapons of mass destruction.
“It’s very important for our [NATO] nations as well as all free nations to work collectively to see to it that Saddam Hussein disarms,” Bush said.
“However, should he choose not to disarm, the United States will lead a coalition of the willing to disarm him and at that point in time, all our nations … will be able choose whether or not they want to participate.”
It was clear before the invasion, and revealed unequivocally afterward that Iraq no longer possessed “weapons of mass destruction,” and that the United States and the United Kingdom intentionally fabricated evidence and cited knowingly deceitful intelligence sources to sell an otherwise unjustified, though very profitable, military adventure to the international community. In the Guardian article, “Defector admits to WMD lies that triggered Iraq war,” it was stated:
The defector who convinced the White House that Iraq had a secret biological weapons programme has admitted for the first time that he lied about his story, then watched in shock as it was used to justify the war.
While Thailand’s sham elections are a misdemeanor in comparison to the invasion, occupation, decimation, and genocide that the “Coalition of the Willing” perpetrated against the people of Iraq, leaving the country in violent upheaval up to and including the present, that “intentional consensus” can be used to justify such a horrific crime against humanity does little to lend to FM Surapong and his regime any semblance of legitimacy.
Upcoming elections will feature the unopposed party of Thaksin Shinawatra, who openly runs both the party and now currently the nation of Thailand, despite being a convicted criminal, a fugitive with a 2 year jail sentence pending, multiple arrest warrants, unprecedented human rights violations, and a long list of pending court cases. An election in which a convicted criminal is openly running by proxy would not be acceptable in another other nation, and as Thai protesters have pointed out, is not acceptable in Thailand either. Thaksin Shinawatra’s foreign backers have attempted to sidestep this inconvenient truth to lend upcoming elections legitimacy.
