Ex-girlfriend denies seeing explosives
The former girlfriend of a fugitive accused of illegally storing explosives in his apartment yesterday denied telling police that he had had the materials when she was still living with him.
"I told police from the very beginning that I had never seen the explosives," Praphassara "Hathaichanok" Suphasukdee said yesterday. Her ex-boyfriend, Somphong In-ngarm, carried only a gun when he served as a bodyguard for the anti-Thaksin Shinawatra movement in the lead-up to the September coup, she said. She said she had never returned to room 1014 at the former Sri Bamrung Mueng apartment since she stopped seeing him in March last year. Somphong is a nephew of Phian Yongnoo, a core member of the People's Alliance for Democracy, which was the major force behind the mass protests against the Thaksin regime. Hathaichanok was speaking publicly for the first time since police claimed on Monday that they had sought an arrest warrant for Somphong based on "her account" that she had seen the explosives cache in his room. The Taling Chan District Court, however, turned down the investigators' request for the warrant. Hathaichanok pleaded with the press to ensure a more accurate coverage of the case but declined to comment on the charges of illegal possession of explosives. "If he really had them and wanted to hide them, why would he ever have kept them there? But if I say I believe he's innocent, it looks like I'm trying to defend him," she said. After a one-hour meeting of senior police investigators in the morning, deputy National Police chief General Phatcharawat Wongsuwan said police had no clues or scientific proof yet to link the items found in Somphong's room with the nine bomb attacks on New Year's Eve or the latest one near Rajvithee Soi 24 on May 5. Police will nevertheless search for more evidence to support another attempt to get an arrest warrant for Somphong next week. Metropolitan Police chief Lt-General Adisorn Nonsee urged Somphong, wherever he was, to turn himself in to police or go through his uncle Phian, but without any conditions for his surrender. An examination of fingerprints found on the explosives is under way, and the results are expected next week, said Lt-General Amphorn Jarujinda, commander of the Police Forensic Science Office.
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