Thailand to boost security for court party ruling

BANGKOK, May 25 (Reuters) Thai Prime Minister Surayud Chulanont ordered police today to boost security ahead of court verdicts next week on whether the country's two top political parties will be disbanded.

Surayud summoned national police chief Sereepisut Taemeyaves after revered King Bhumibol Adulyadej, addressing growing fears that next Wednesday's verdicts would spawn bloodshed, said the rulings would cause strife whatever they were.

''The prime minister has asked us to take great care of security, urging the police to stay neutral and trying all means to prevent clashes,'' Sereepisut said after an hour-long meeting.

Surayud said he had cut two days off a visit to China and would arrive there on Monday and leave on Tuesday so he could be in Bangkok when the verdicts are announced.

''The emergency decree is ready at hand'' allowing the deployment of troops on the streets and a curfew if protests did turn violent, Defence Minister Boonrawd Somtas said.

The security boost followed a speech by King Bhumibol addressing fears that the verdicts by the Constitutional Tribunal would generate street protests by supporters of ousted prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra which could lead to violence.

''You have the responsibility to prevent the country from collapsing,'' King Bhumibol, speaking slowly and appearing to choose his words with care, told top judges at his Chitralada Palace in Bangkok yesterday.

''Whatever the verdict will be, it will bring damage to the country. Whatever direction it will take, it will be erroneous,'' he said in a 15-minute speech broadcast on national television.

Sereepisut urged people to stay away on Wednesday from a court whose verdicts on whether Thaksin's Thai Rak Thai (Thais Love Thais) and the Democrat Party should be disbanded for breaches of electoral law will be broadcast live.

''If you love the king, please listen to and follow his remarks.

Stay home, drink tea or coffee while watching,'' he said.

Both parties promised restraint whatever the verdicts, due to be announced an hour apart, and analysts said the words of King Bhumibol, who is genuinely revered, should cool the tension.

''We will do everything to prevent confrontation,'' acting Thai Rak Thai leader Chaturon Chaisang told Reuters, although he said about 3,000 members were expected to show up at the party headquarters in Bangkok.

''We won't rally at the Constitutional Tribunal or chaos would take place,'' he said, denying government reports that thousands of party supporters from the countryside, along with 99 elephants, were due to show up there.

''We won't be the one who starts the trouble,'' Democrat leader Abhisit Vejjajiva told a Bangkok radio station. '' We believe violence won't be supported by the people.'' The army-installed government says it is prepared to invoke an emergency decree if protests turn violent.

Thai Rak Thai and the Democrats are accused of violating election laws in an inconclusive general election last year that was annulled later by the courts.

The parties face dissolution and their top leadership, including Thaksin, who is living in exile in London, could be banned from politics for five years.

Many analysts believe the generals want that verdict to complete their coup by barring Thaksin from politics despite his frequent statements, generally disbelieved in Thailand, that he has quit.

If Thai Rak Thai were not disbanded, the justification for ousting Thaksin, accused of abuse of power and presiding over rampant corruption, would be undermined, analysts say.

REUTERS SM SSC1413