(Unofficial transcript)

Keynote Speech by
H.E. Mr. Kasit Piromya
Minister of Foreign Affairs of Thailand
Special British Chamber of Commerce Thailand (BCCT) Luncheon 11 June 2010
Banyan Tree Hotel, Bangkok

Since previous speakers from the Government side, namely the Finance Minister, President of Thailand Trade Representative, and the Secretary-General to the Prime Minister, were all experts in economics, I intend to focus my talk today more on political side, and a little bit on foreign policy direction.

On the domestic front, I wish to reassure you of the wish of the Thai populace to make Thailand a full-fletch democratic society. The fact that they did not come out in large number to join the Red-Shirt protesters, did not condone violence activity, is testimony to the fact that Thai people would like to have a democratization process in Thailand, to move along peacefully with consensus-making as a rule, with the rule of law, and to have the atmosphere of dialogue-making-as a way to think about the final decision to move the Thai society further. We should not doubt the wishes of the Thai people.

Second, about this particular government, I think the Prime Minister or the major coalition partner is from the Democrat Party. And for the past 63 - 64 years, we have proven to the Thai society and to the international community at large that we are really a democratic party. We are at the moment a member of the Liberal International, an organization based in London. At the same time, we are also member of Council of Asian Liberals and Democrats, based in the Philippines. So, internationally, from the political party point of view, we do participate in the whole democratization process of the world at large. And in a few weeks time, I will be in Warsaw to participate in the Conference on the Democratic Communities, organized and hosted by the Polish government. I am going there not only to simply represent the Thai government, but I do go with the belief in freedom of expression, human rights, democratic principles, the consensus-making, and the multi-party system.

What the Thai society as well as the Democrat Party has been fighting all along are 1) military government, 2) mixture of civilian-military authoritarian government, and, lately for the past 6 - 7 years, 3) to fight against one-party autocratic of elected government. In short, to fight against any sort of illiberal democracy that we are seeing more and more in certain countries. To say this with utmost apology, one example would be Venezuela. We are fully aware that the government can be elected, but at the end of the day that government could turn autocratic, illiberal, and deny the people of the basic human rights and political freedom. There are a couple of countries around the world without having to mention. All along until this very moment, we have been fighting not to have this one-party system having the whole of the political power in their hands. The other point is that we will not condone any type of extra-constitutional activities. The ~ Thai society has demonstrated to the world that they are ready to fight again. 

What are we going to do next?

The past year and a half, PM Abhisit has always demonstrated that he's willing to have a dialogue. More important than that, what we have stated during the campaign at the end of the year 2000, and through out our years as the opposition party, about bringing about political and economic development of Thailand, we have been practicing in full for the past year and a half. What we have said during the campaign or at the pronouncement of PM Abhisit to the parliament, when we first came into power at the end of 2008, we have carried them out to the full-we have implemented what we have promised the people. This would be the name of the game. This would be the cause of action that we would continue to do so.

And the fact that PM Abhisit, a few weeks back, had come out with the 5-point national reconciliation. Two days ago, we already have an independent fact-finding Committee, headed by Dr. Kanit Na Nakorn, to investigate what happened in terms of the deaths, the injuries and the atrocities that happened in Thailand in the past few months, particularly between the 14 - 20 May 2010. We also have a Committee, chaired by Dr. Sombat Thamrongthanyawong from NIDA, which will look at the constitutional amendments. We will have various committees to look into the social inequalities, and so on. Another committee headed by professor at Chulalongkorn University is to deal with issue of media ethics, how the media could be more objective and not be politicized, or to have the political influence in their daily activities.

At the same time, at the government house, through Khunying Supatra Masdit-a long time politician, highly respected domestically and internationally-will be the coordinator to look at the overall push towards a more open society with less inequality, and so on, whereby every stakeholder in the Thai society can fully express hisfher view and participate in the making of open, democratic Thailand, where the gap and the notion or myth about the urban ruler device, about elite and the masses, about the privileged class and the mass poverty will no longer be the case in Thailand. The gaps between the rich and the poor remains at 12.5 times, which has been like this for the past 30 - 40 years. Hope that with the participating of everyone, all walks of lives in Thailand will get out of this predicament, move Thailand forward, and to stand tall, respectable, and have the determination not only on itself but also to contribute to Southeast Asia and to the world at large, in terms of open society, moderation, tolerance and so on.

Wish to point out the fact that Thailand was elected to the Human Rights Council (HRC). Out of 14 candidates, we came second. We got 182 votes out of 188 countries participated. Despite many uncertainties in Thailand's political, economic, and social instability, the world has shown its confidence and trust in Thailand--that we are moving towards an open society and that we would be able to contribute to the openness of society, where human beings do respect one another inside the border and across the border. Within the context of HRC, within the United Nations, Thailand hopes to be able to use the experience it had to go through for the past 6 - 7 decades, from military, autocratic regime to the more open, tolerant society would also be helpful through its activity inside the HRC. To this end, we would like to thank the British government for the support.

Future direction for Thailand

Besides being a democratic and open society, in the past 10 - 15 years, we have become more of an emerging donor-providing both technical assistance and soft loans-to fellow developing countries, particularly countries in the neighbourhood. So, there is a new role for Thailand, in terms of humanitarian assistance and development assistance. At the same time, 3 in the future, we will see more of Thailand's role in the peace-keeping process under the UN flag. We will do more work in the disaster management. We will participate more in order to minimize and overcome cross-border crimes and cross-border issues, whether it has to do with deceases, climate change or criminal activities such as drugs, trade in small arms or in human organs. So we will be a very active participant of the international community-both at the bilateral, regional and international context.

What should the British Business Community do in Thailand?

1) Alternative Energy
     One must go back to the policy direction of the government. We are serious about reducing import of oil from the Middle East, Myanmar and Brunei, so alternative and renewable energy is one of the top priorities of this government. British technology and know-how would be most welcomed. We have the raw materials namely molasses, palm oil, tapioca and cassava. Therefore, I would like to invite British companies to come in both in terms of research activities and in terms of production of alternative and renewable energy. We have a lot of sun, so solar energy is also another possibility we could make use of. At the same time, British and Thai companies can run together into third country, especially in Laos and Myanmar for hydro-power.

2) Agro-industry.
     You have excellent research, agricultural equipment, agricultural management, technical know-how and so on. And we still need to upgrade the food quality for the food export, food safety, food standards, packaging, and the diversification of the food products to make them more value-added. This is where British companies can come in. I think your agricultural, your agro-industry and agricultural equipment are second to none. We do have a shared future in this field, and together we can go into third country as well.

3) Creative Economy 
      The other area you could come in, and which I am sure you have known, is the creative economy-where the government is putting strong emphasis upon. There is a special committee set up, chaired by the PM, and I also sit in that committee. The National Committee to Drive Creative Economy, with a budget of a couple of billion Baht, is to look into promoting creativity amongst young Thai population. Creative industry-inclusive of technological and scientific advancement for the green economy and environmentally friendly economic activities-therefore, is another area we can work together.

4) Education
      The last point I would like to put emphasis upon, in spite of the forthcoming competition from down under, namely Australia and New Zealand, is the field of education. You must have noticed that in every Thai university now, there is at least one department or faculty that the medium of instruction is in the English language. And I think this is something we could do more with the British education and British institution. Not only in terms of pure education activities, but also in the area of R&D. When it comes to R&D, it is the intention of the Thai Government to put at least 2% of GDP into R&D activities. We must do more in this field because Thailand can no longer recourse to the Compulsory Licensing (CL). We should use our brain and our scientists to do more research in the pharmaceutical field, in the transformation of so many agricultural produce into industrial raw material. So the field is very much open to British laboratories, scientific institutions and Universities.

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