Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are posing the question the Immigration Bureau may arrest before a former Thai Prime Minister? I thought of making this video after reading a recent article from the Thai Examiner, that is thaiexaminer.com, the article is titled: Immigration Bureau chief says he's preparing for a possible return of Thaksin who faces arrest. Now for those who are unaware, Thaksin Shinawatra, is a former Prime Minister of Thailand. Politics is not really within the scope of this channel so I am not going to get into the background on all of that and the political background and all that good stuff. For those are unaware, just Google him, you can get as much history of that as you want but yeah so a lot going on here. 

As per usual, Thai Examiner does a pretty good job of really delineating a lot of insight with regard to not only this but just sort of in general. So I urge those who are watching this video, go read that article in detail, a lot of good information in there. I am going to quote a couple of excerpts. Quoting directly: "Thailand's Immigration Bureau Chief Police Lieutenant General Pakphoomphiphat Sajaphan, on Wednesday, told reporters that his Officers were coordinating a response to the eventuality of the return of former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra to Thailand. Mr. Thaksin's daughter, key Pheu Thai leader, Ms. Paetongtarn Shinawatra, on the same day, told reporters that although her family was concerned at the prospect of her father's return on a personal basis, the decision was one he had to take alone. She confirmed that, at this time, he has not decided to postpone his intended return on July 26th." Quoting further: "The Immigration Bureau Chief said that if Mr. Thaksin should decide to travel back and enter Thailand, that it would present his force with a challenge for which, it must be prepared. The Police Chief sidestepped questions about the political nature of Mr. Thaksin's predicament and said that his Officers would strictly follow procedures laid down which everyone is aware of and should accept." Again not to get it too deep into that, apparently there are some outstanding warrants associated with some prior matters. As a result, there may be Immigration enforcement implications in the event that this individual should return to Thailand.

As we have noted in other videos, there is a criminal law element sort of a law enforcement element associated with Thai Immigration and this can have implications not only for foreign nationals but for Thai nationals as well because in the event that someone returns for example to Thailand who has again, pending charges against them in the Kingdom, pending criminal charges, the first contact that such an individual would presumably have with Thai Law enforcement would be Immigration so it stands to reason that Immigration would be poised to be the entity if you will that would have to deal with possible arrest and then due process, processing that individual through the system so as to go ahead and effect well going through the judicial system. 

So again how exactly this is going to play out remains to be seen but it's noteworthy because again, although the underlying issue would appear to be something akin to a criminal matter, again it has Immigration implications again because an individual traveling into Thailand, their first contact with Thai Law Enforcement is going to be with Immigration not unlike for example US Customs and Border Protection in the United States. Oftentimes, if someone has a pending warrant in the United States it will often be at the border where they will end up having to interact with that and again it is going to be case and circumstance specific how exactly that's going to all play out as it would be in this case. So it will be interesting to see if it is relevant to the thrust of this channel. We will certainly keep you updated on this channel as the situation evolves.