The organisation, Thai Lawyers for Human Rights (TLHR), received an Albies award in New York on September 28. Yasothon native Sirikan Charoensiri, representing TLHR, delivered an impassioned speech at the awards ceremony, declaring, “We still have a long way to go toward true democracy.”
Sisters of Isan displays Isan (the northeastern part of Thailand)’s value and their construction at the beginning of the 20th century together with Thailand as a modern state. The book has recorded the stories of two sisters growing up and working from the countryside to Bangkok. At the same time, the book shows the perspectives of Isan people through their belief, lifestyle, culture, social norm, value and fate. This book covers the changes by over 50 years of Isan workers and Thailand. Hence, beyond two sisters who had shifted from rural to urban landscape, the stories inside reflect how Thai society has come. The struggle is not something Isan people choose, whereas, reading this book may imply the answer. Sisters of Isan is not just a book. This infers lives… the Isan’s lives.
“The Bangkok Tragedy” refers to the government-backed massacre of members of the red shirt movement, when a military crackdown on protesters from May 10 to May 19, 2010, resulted in at least 94 deaths.
The Pak Mun Dam has long been controversial. It is blamed for the devastation of the surrounding ecosystem, so much so to the point that locals can no longer make a living from fishing, their traditional livelihood. Although the locals established the Assembly of the Poor to move against the construction and call out the government for their failure to take responsibility for the impacts to their livelihood and the environment, officials have continued to disregard their voices. The fishers of the Mun River who still love their profession, the ecosystem, and their hometown, have collectively said that the dam has permanently destroyed their livelihood and the trade in fisheries.
