BANGKOK: A Thai court yesterday sentenced a woman to five years in jail for breaching the kingdom’s strict royal defamation laws in the the second such conviction in days.
Under controversial lese majeste rules, anyone convicted of insulting the Thai king, queen, heir or regent faces up to 15 years in prison on each count.
Nopawan Tangudomsuk was found guilty of lese majeste and breaking computer crime laws with comments posted on a popular website in 2008, an official from Bangkok’s court of appeal said, without giving further details. She was acquitted in a 2011 trial when prosecutors failed to prove she was behind the posting on the Prachatai site -- whose editor has been convicted in a separate case of failing to remove a comment critical of the monarchy. “The appeal court decided to reverse the ruling”, a court official said, adding she was “found guilty of violating the royal defamation law. AFP
