<p>Under the junta’s climate of fear and intimidation where politicians, academics, and civil society are silenced, a high school student, Parit Chiwarak, withstands the pressure and actively protects the right to free education from the junta’s attempts to abolish it.&nbsp; <br /></p>

<p dir="ltr">Citing arms race in Southeast Asia as a primary reason, the Thai junta has embraced a plan to equip the Royal Thai Navy with submarines. However, many wonder if the extra 36 billion baht in military spending could be a burden to the struggling Thai economy when it could be spent on other necessities.</p> <p></p>

<div>The liberation movement engaged in armed struggle for the independence of the three southernmost provinces has always cited Thailand’s assimilation policy and its discrimination against the use of local Malay language as one of the main reasons of the armed struggle.&nbsp;The policy of language discrimination in Thailand dates back at least 80 years ago.&nbsp;These decreed that Thai nationals, whatever their ethnicity, must speak Thai, learn Thai in school. This greatly affected people in the Deep South whose first language is Malay.Due to this uncompromising assimilation policy, the state of Malay in Patani has become very weak and marginalized. Hara Shintaro, an expert in Malay and&nbsp;and fierce critic of Deep South politics discusses how&nbsp;the language, Malay identity and violent conflict are intertwined</div> <p></p>

<div>Prachatai talked with a key member of Thailand’s restive Deep South’s liberation movement engaging in a peace dialogue with Bangkok about the violence during Ramadan month, their strategy and the future of the peace process.&nbsp;</div> <p></p>

<div>“The NCPO’s motto is ‘Returning Happiness to the People’, but I receive only bitterness. I don’t know where my happiness is,” said a community leader arbitrarily detained because he allegedly is an 'influential person' which must be suppressed under NCPO Head Order No. 13/2016.</div> <div> </div>

<div>Following a meeting with the Election Commission of Thailand, on 18 May, Damaso G. Magbual, chairperson and co-founder of the Asian Network for Free Elections (ANFREL), met with Prachatai English for an interview to discuss what the presence of an election monitoring group may mean for the upcoming referendum vote.&nbsp;</div> <div> </div>

<div>Weakening elected government officials, enhancing bureaucracy, and increasing relations with influential capitalists is what the military is trying to do to secure its legitimacy after “the transition”, says Prajak Kongkirati, a political scientist from Thammasat University.</div> <p></p>

<div>Thai human rights are in free fall; the ruling junta perceives human rights as a threat to national security. NCPO Order No. 13/2016 is the junta’s attempt to establish a full military regime, says Sunai Phasuk, advisor to Human Rights Watch Thailand.&nbsp;</div> <p></p>

<div>Since the release of the draft constitution, the junta has formally and informally suppressed criticism of the draft as well as the referendum, scheduled to be held on 7 August, itself. Although it is obvious that Thais are not going to vote in the referendum in a free and fair manner, a group of red-shirt activists are determined to defy the junta’s rule by campaigning against the draft charter. They share with Prachatai how to mobilize campaign under such repression and what they've found about voters' attitude toward draft charter and politics.&nbsp;</div> <p></p>

<p dir="ltr">Thailand’s head of the team engaged in peace talks with the Deep South independence movements says last month’s siege of Cho-airong Hospital shows disunity among the movement. However, this disunity will benefit Bangkok.</p> <p></p>

<div><em>A human rights activist from Thailand’s Deep South speaks about her motivation for co-founding a human rights organization, after her own experience of a family member being harassed. Since the start of 2016, she has been repeatedly harassed by the military due to a report, co-written by her, revealing allegations of torture by the state.&nbsp;</em></div> <p></p>

<div>Pavin Chachavalpongpun has been known as a fierce critic of the Thai Army since before Gen Prayut Chan-o-cha staged the coup d’état in May 2014. After the coup, he continued to criticize the junta leader in his mischievous and acerbic manner on his Facebook page, but also in frank and serious articles and interviews. Gen Prayut got so irritated that he called Pavin “a jerk” (คนเฮงซวย in Thai.)</div> <p></p>