He was commenting on the shipment of the eight Thai elephants to Australia in exchange for Koala bears. Thai non government organisations blocked the initial transfers of the elephants from Kanchanaburi. However the elephants were quietly relocated to the U Tapao airport in Chonburi province on Sunday night and police set up checkpoints to delay the protesters.

"It is not appropriate to secretly transfer the elephants. I regard this as an attempt to steal the national properties and it effected dignity of the country and people as a whole," Surin said.

The government has given conflicting information on the exchange programme.

"I wonder why the government promised at the beginning that it would have the DNA test on the elephants. But then they turned around and said the DNA test would be too complicated," said Surin, who is deputy Democrat Party leader.

"Now the government is allowing the secret transfer of the elephants. This signaled that there is something hidden on the matter," said Surin, adding that the controversy was not a good for the bilateral ties between the countries.

"The best way is to make public details of the agreement for the sake of the cooperation and the bilateral relations," he said.

The Nation