[moonlight]

latest updates

BTS halts services Saturday
The Bangkok Transit System announced that its skytrain services on both routes will be completely halted for Saturday on safety concern.
For more information, please contact 0-2617-7300 ext 1834, 1842.

Field reporters have tweeted that there are noticeably fewer press at Ratchaprasong stage today after some were injured yesterday.

TR @Bancha_nna 9.45am Clashes reported @ Soi Rang Nam; cars U-Turn on Sri Ayutthaya and Ratchaparop to avoid clashes causing heavy traffic.

Erawan Emergency Medical Centre: 16 dead, 141 injured in clashes between troops and Red Shirt protesters on Friday

Red shirts burn public telephone booth in front of Lumpini Boxing Stadium

Red-shirt protesters set fire to a public telephone booth in front of the Lumpini Boxing Stadium at 8:57 am Saturday, Jor Sor 100 traffic radio station reported.
The fire spread to nearby commercial building and fire fighters could not go in to put out the blaze yet.
Sporadic gunfire and explosions were heard in the area.
Troops also fired into the sky to warn protesters not to attack them.

They also used motorbikes more extensively to get behind military lines (eg in rangnam) and then attack from behind

The army is essentailly having to fight 360 degrees, // could that not be their fault on positioning and combat?

An ambulance is trying to get in to rangnam but has just been hit by a molotv cocktail

One journalist has been shot dead and several more wounded in the Thai capital since anti-government protests broke out in March, underscoring the dangers facing media covering the chaotic clashes.
Three journalists suffered gunshot wounds Friday while covering the latest explosion of violence in Bangkok, where troops opened fire during a tense confrontation with "Red Shirt" demonstrators in the heart of the city.
Nelson Rand, a television reporter with France 24, was hit by three bullets and seriously injured, his network reported.

"One hit his leg, one his torso and another his wrist, which has multiple fractures. The doctors say his condition is now stable but that he was gravely wounded," Rand's colleague Cyril Payen said on air.
A photographer with the Thai newspaper Matichon was also shot in the leg during Friday's clashes, as was a cameraman with Voice-TV, a cable television station owned by the family of former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra.
Hiro Muramoto, a Japanese cameraman with the Thomson Reuters news agency, was shot and killed covering an unsuccessful military operation on April 10 to clear an area of the capital that left a total of 25 people dead.
Journalists have been a visible presence on the streets of the capital since the opposition "Red Shirts" began their mass protests in mid-March in a campaign to topple a government they see as undemocratic.
While some are war-hardened foreign correspondents wearing flak jackets and helmets, others have little protection.

Alongside professionals, tourists and amateur photographers have often been seen taking pictures of the protests -- a sign, perhaps, of the growing role of "citizen journalism" relaying news through blogs and online forums.
After three members of the press were wounded within just a few hours Friday, the media watchdog Reporters Without Borders called on the army and the protesters "to guarantee the safety of the journalists" in the capital.
"The confusion reigning in various parts of Bangkok does not suffice to explain the shooting injuries sustained by several Thai and foreign journalists since April," it said in a statement.
"Both camps must comply fully with the requirements of international law, according to which journalists cannot be military targets," it added.
On Thursday night, a renegade army general allied to the Red Shirts was shot in the head and gravely wounded while he gave an interview to a foreign newspaper reporter, Thomas Fuller of the International Herald Tribune.
"I was facing him, he was answering my questions, looking at me and the bullet hit him in the forehead, from what I could tell," Fuller told CNN.
"It looks like the bullet came over my head and struck him. I don't have any way of confirming this beyond what I remember from the scene but it felt like it grazed my head," he added.
Supporters of Major-General Khattiya Sawasdipol, better known by his nickname "Seh Daeng", said he was targeted by a sniper.
The army, which had warned Thursday it would deploy marksmen around the Reds' protest site, denied any involvement in the shooting.
Satit Wongnongtoey, minister attached to the prime minister's office, urged media to "clearly identify themselves" while covering the violent and unpredictable unrest, which has left at least 16 dead and 141 injured.
"Cameramen are easily targeted by armed persons and face high risks as they work in the middle of the authorities and protesters. Media should be stationed at one place while they are covering a story, not walking around."
Many reporters wear green armbands issued by the Thai Journalists Association near the rally site, which they can freely enter.
Their blog posts -- relaying a steady stream of reports of gunfire and protesters hurt or killed -- illustrate the chaotic situation on the ground.
"Just back in office after crazy afternoon to edit TV piece. Snapper told me a protester was shot in the head near our petrol station stop," BBC correspondent Alastair Leithead wrote on Twitter.
"Lots of bullets and big bangs -- even more confusing in the darkness," he added later.
Another deadly day for my courageous colleagues. Three journalists injured," wrote Andrew Marshall, a reporter for Time Magazine.