Thai ministry stormed after govt declares emergency

BANGKOK, (Reuters) – Thai Prime Minister Abhisit  Vejjajiva declared a state of emergency yesterday to quell  political unrest and threatened to take tough action against  protesters who have gathered in Bangkok.

Troops fired into the air when anti-government protesters  stormed the interior ministry yesterday. The crowds mobbed the  prime minister’s car and beat it with clubs as he drove away  from the ministry.

Supporters of former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra  triggered the emergency when they pushed past riot troops into  the venue of a major Asian summit in the southern resort of  Pattaya, forcing the meetings to be cancelled. Some leaders had  to flee by helicopter.

After declaring victory there, the “red shirt” Thaksin  supporters have been gathering all day at Government House in  central Bangkok. By evening they numbered around 40,000.

The protesters set up makeshift road blocks and men, some  with sticks, manned the barricades. Near midnight, the crowd  remain-ed large, although some had begun trickling home.

Thaksin, who has been making nightly phone calls to his  supporters from exile, said earlier yesterday it was now the  “golden time” to rise up against the government.

He repeated his call for a “people’s revolution” and said he  was ready to move back to Thailand to lead a people’s uprising  if there was a coup.