Football
Reuters 17y

Soccer-Ousted Thai PM unfit to own Man City, says rights group

BANGKOK, Aug 1 - Ousted Thai Prime Minister and
new Manchester City proprietor Thaksin Shinawatra is unfit to
own an English soccer club because of "serious human rights
abuses" under his leadership, Human Rights Watch said.

In a July 30 letter to English soccer chiefs, the New
York-based watchdog said numerous extrajudicial executions,
abductions and disappearances happened during Thaksin's six
years in office, which ended with a military coup in September
2006.

In a response, the English Premier League said it took such
allegations very seriously.

However, its "fit and proper" test for club owners only
barred people who had been convicted of offences, chief
executive Richard Scudamore said.

"You can be assured that we will always operate within the
law and will always take into account any evidence as verified
by the appropriate legal process," Scudamore said.

The generals who ousted Thaksin cited "rampant corruption"
as a primary reason for launching Thailand's 18th coup in 75
years of on-off democracy.

One year later, they have frozen more than $1.5 billion of
the former telecoms tycoon's assets in Thai bank accounts and
Thaksin has been summonsed to Bangkok's Supreme Court this
month to hear corruption charges.

However, given the complexities of Thailand's byzantine
legal system, a conviction would probably be at least two years
away.

Thaksin's family cemented their control of Manchester City
last month, when they took ownership of 75 percent of the
shares in the struggling club.

Thaksin, who has been living in exile since the coup, has
said his 81 million pound ($163.8 million) takeover would help
improve Thai soccer and bring the good times back to a club
which last tasted major success 31 years ago.

However, analysts call the move a publicity stunt to boost
his image among the soccer-obsessed Thai masses, whose votes
gave Thaksin unprecedented landslide election victories in 2001
and 2005.

Much of Human Rights Watch's criticism stemmed from
Thaksin's 2003 "war on drugs" in which the group claims around
2,500 people were killed, and the heavy-handed approach Thai
security forces took in battling a bloody separatist insurgency
in the Muslim-majority far south.

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