#AndyHall Senior MEP condemns 'unbelievable' Thai decision to uphold criminal charges against rights activist

A senior MEP has reacted furiously to the decision of the Thai authorities to uphold the “trumped up” charges against a human-rights activist who faces up to seven years’ in jail for exposing “modern slavery” in Thailand.  

Briton Andy Hall (pictured) is being tried by the Thai authorities for criminal defamation and 'computer crimes' after raising instances of modern slavery in Thailand.

On Monday (18 January), at his indictment hearing it was announced that the authorities in Thailand intend to uphold the charges against Hall and the date for the commencement of his full trial was set for 19 May.

Hall, whose passport has been confiscated by the Thai authorities and who is forbidden from leaving the country, submitted a list of 33 witnesses, explained who they were and how he would fight the case.

He highlighted that the Finnwatch report at the centre of the allegations against him was not his report, as has been claimed by the Thai authorities, and that he did not publish it.   Irrespective of this, he told the court that the research and interviews it contains are “in the public interest.”

Natural Fruit, Thailand's biggest producer of canned pineapples, has accused Hall of defamation and computer crimes over a report published in 2013 that, it says, he helped author for Finnwatch, a Finland-based watchdog group. The report, Cheap Has a High Price, alleged ill-treatment of migrant workers at a factory owned by the Thai firm.  The indictment means Hall will face a second trial over the report after a previous lawsuit was thrown out by a Thai court on a technicality in 2014.  Hall, who denies the charges against him, said: "I only collected raw data and took no part in analyzing the data. Finnwatch officials were responsible for that. They also put the report on the website, not me.”

The researcher has fought to protect human rights in south east Asia for the past 10 years and the research for Finnwatch documents the “dreadful” treatment of migrant workers in Natural Fruit. The Thai authorities continue to hold Hall's passport even though the UK Government have asked for this to be returned.

Speaking after the hearing, Hall, who is on bail, told this website: “'I respect but strongly disagree with the court's decision to indict me in the Natural Fruit case for a Finnwatch authored report I didn't write and publication of this report on a Finnwatch website to which I have no personal access.”

He added: “Criminal defamation and computer crimes laws are bad laws being poorly abused within Thailand's criminal justice system. Freedom of expression and the ability to assist migrant victims of abuse, trafficking and exploitation is being seriously curtailed by the threat of use of these such laws and the use of these laws against rights activists and against people like myself in such high profile and threatening ways."

Hall has the backing of British MEP Glenis Willmott, leader of the European Parliamentary Labour Party, who told EU Reporter: "It is unbelievable that the Thai authorities have upheld these charges against Andy. When did it become a crime to stand up for migrant workers? I will continue to support Andy's plight, we must protect labour-rights activists across the world.

"The fact that the Thai authorities have refused to return Andy's passport, even at the request of the UK government, is shocking. Andy's ongoing maltreatment is unacceptable and I will continue to raise his plight and call for justice."

The case has once again highlighted growing concern about conditions in the Thai seafood industry with Brussels-based Human Rights Without Frontiers (HRWF), an internationally respected NGO, calling for a ban on seafood products from Thailand in protest at "intolerable" conditions in the country's fishing industry.   Earlier this week, HRWF director, Willy Fautre said: “The EU can no longer tolerate a slavery situation in Thai fisheries and should ban any seafood import as long as Thailand has not provided strong evidence that it is seriously implementing policies aiming at the eradication of this practice.”

A European Union delegation is currently in Thailand to analyze any improvements made by Thailand to combat illegal, unregulated and unreported (IUU) fishing.The mission, one of several planned by the EU, will be instrumental in deciding whether or not the European bloc will impose a ban on the entry of Thai fishery products to the EU market. The European Commission issued a yellow card, or official warning, to the Thais last April. But the six-month period expired in October and an EU decision is believed to be imminent on whether this should be raised to a red card, or outright ban on seafood products from Thailand.

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