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Teenager With Letters Rattles Thai Junta as Crackdown Grows

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Watana Muangsook is escorted by military officers as he arrives at a military base in Bangkok in April 2016.

Watana Muangsook is escorted by military officers as he arrives at a military base in Bangkok in April 2016.

Photographer: Narong Sangnak/EPA
By
Chris Blake
Updated on

When Thai politician Watana Muangsook was being held at a rural army camp for defying the military government, the junta decided there was a new threat: His teenage daughter, who should leave the country.

The 18-year-old had been visiting foreign embassies last month with the media in tow to deliver letters complaining the military had taken her father away for a fifth time. After a phone call from a senior member of the junta, her family decided to send her into temporary exile.