BANGKOK, THAILAND: Thailand will spend at least 1 billion baht (S$43 million) to compensate tourists left stranded by the closure of the two Bangkok airports by anti-government protesters.
Each tourist will get 2,000 baht a day from a special fund until he flies home.
Thai Deputy Premier and Foreign Minister Sompong Amornwiwat said the roughly 3,000 Thais stranded in airports abroad will get the same amount.
It is estimated that over 30,000 travellers are missing their Bangkok flights each day. A naval airbase is handling only part of the load amid chaos.
Meanwhile, grenade attacks targeting protesters injured at least 51 people yesterday. Forty-nine were hurt when a grenade was lobbed at the offices of Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat, which the anti-government People's Alliance for Democracy occupied in August.
The incident escalated fears of violence as it happened just before 4,000 pro-government demonstrators held their own rally in central Bangkok. But the event went off peacefully.
The police were also promising peaceful methods as the authorities employed carrot-and-stick tactics to end the siege at the airports. The police said fresh talks had started at both venues - but then the police negotiator at the domestic airport issued a new order to protesters there, warning that they faced two years in jail if they did not disperse.
"Time is running out... The police will work with compromise, no force, no weapons," said Mr Pongsapat Pongcharoen, assistant to the national police chief. However, there is talk that a court ruling in a fraud case tomorrow could lead to the dissolution of the ruling People Power Party and the banning of its leaders from politics.
