Agencies in the justice system should apply the Act on Promoting a Peaceful Society to a consistent standard

Following the promulgation of the Act on Promoting a Peaceful Society, B.E. 2569 (2026), in force since 24 August 2026, which grants an amnesty in cases arising from assembly or expression motivated by political conflict or political motivation, committed between 1 January 2005 and 16 July 2025.

Although the Act still excludes from the amnesty cases under Section 112 of the Criminal Code — which ought to count as another significant category of case arising from political expression over the past two decades — the Act nonetheless accepts that the acts alleged, arising from assembly or expression motivated by political conflict, are not crimes; that proceedings should be terminated, cases struck from the docket, and criminal records deleted for those accused during the period of political conflict, so as to restore their human dignity and to lift the burden of the criminal process from the many accused persons and defendants in political cases.

Since the Act came into force, however, circumstances have arisen in the enforcement and judicial interpretation of the law that lack any clear or settled standard, with the result that accused persons and defendants who ought to receive an amnesty continue to have their liberty restricted and to bear the burden of criminal proceedings.

In the two weeks since the Act took effect, several different patterns have emerged. The Criminal Court has ordered the termination of assembly cases it considered to fall within the amnesty, and struck them from the docket immediately. At the same time, in the case of political detainees who meet the criteria for an amnesty and who applied for release, it ordered a hearing of the applications, setting the hearing a month after the applications were filed.

The Bangkok South Criminal Court, by contrast, ordered that all applications on this question be sent to the Committee for Promoting a Peaceful Society — which is still awaiting establishment — for it to determine whether the cases fall within the amnesty, giving as its reason that the conclusive determination of whether a case receives an amnesty is the Committee’s power.

There has also been a case in which the Central Criminal Court for Corruption and Misconduct Cases considered an application in the case of a detainee prosecuted over the closing of polling stations in 2013, and ordered a warrant of release on the view that the case met the criteria for an amnesty — after taking about a week to consider it, without any hearing at all, merely serving the application on the prosecution.

There has likewise been a case at the Dusit Kwaeng Court in which the court gave notice that it was terminating the proceedings and striking the case from the docket, in two cases arising from assemblies by the P-Move group, on the view that they met the criteria under the Act — with no step required of the defense at all. That is before counting the application of this Act at other stages, such as the police and the public prosecutor, where the procedure for terminating a case remains unclear.

This situation in the interpretation of the Act gives rise to a problem of uncertain standards, and creates confusion for the very people the amnesty law is meant to benefit.

Thai Lawyers for Human Rights, which provides legal assistance to people prosecuted for exercising the rights and liberties of political expression, and which also collects data, monitors the situation, and publishes information on human rights violations, takes the following view of this situation.

1. Section 8, paragraph one provides expressly:

“When this Act has come into force, in a case where a person entitled under Section 7 has not yet been prosecuted before a court, or is under investigation by an inquiry official or a public prosecutor, the inquiry official or the public prosecutor shall suspend or discontinue the investigation or the prosecution, as the case may be. If that person has already been prosecuted before a court and the case is pending before any court, that court shall terminate the proceedings and strike the case from the docket.”

เมื่อพระราชบัญญัตินี้มีผลบังคับใช้แล้ว ในกรณีที่ผู้ได้รับสิทธิตามมาตรา ๗ ยังมิได้ถูกฟ้องคดีต่อศาลหรืออยู่ในระหว่างการสอบสวนของพนักงานสอบสวนหรือพนักงานอัยการ ให้พนักงานสอบสวนหรือพนักงานอัยการระงับหรือยุติการสอบสวนหรือการฟ้องคดี แล้วแต่กรณี หากผู้นั้นถูกฟ้องคดีต่อศาลแล้วและคดีอยู่ในระหว่างการพิจารณาของศาลใด ให้ศาลนั้นยุติการพิจารณาและจำหน่ายคดีออกจากสารบบความ

The wording of this provision is a mandatory provision (บทบังคับเด็ดขาด) which requires inquiry officials, public prosecutors, and the courts to act. Each agency that considers the case file has the direct power and duty to examine the offense charged, and the date of the act as stated in the indictment, against the Schedule annexed to the Act.

Where it appears that a case plainly meets the criteria, the court must order the case struck from the docket immediately. The legislature having enacted a law to grant an amnesty for the conduct in question, the court — as the independent judicial organ that enforces and interprets the law — must not decline, or push back to the executive or to the Committee, the power that Section 8 confers on the court itself. To interpret the provision as requiring the matter to be referred to the Committee and its decision awaited is to create an unnecessary procedural step and to place an undue burden on the defendant. The same applies to the conduct of matters at the stage of the inquiry official and of the public prosecutor.

2. The situation in which each court adopts a different approach to making orders in different cases has the effect that people who have been prosecuted — in particular those whose cases remain in the justice process, some of whom are still held in prison, and who ought to have the effect of this Act applied to them as a matter of urgency — receive that benefit only after delay. And to this day there is still no clarity as to the establishment or the working methods of the Committee for Promoting a Peaceful Society.

In these circumstances defendants ought to have their cases considered speedily and fairly. Where a case plainly falls within the Act, the court should order it struck from the docket under Section 7.

Section 7 provides that the acts of a person who meets the substantive and temporal conditions of the Act shall not constitute an offense, that the person shall be relieved from being an offender and shall not be regarded as having ever committed an offense, and shall be relieved from criminal liability and Pinai regulatory liability. It therefore has the effect of erasing the offense and the penalty retrospectively and immediately, by operation of law. The State’s right to punish is thereby immediately extinguished, and the court is left without any legal basis for continuing the proceedings or for continuing to restrict the defendant’s liberty.

3. The powers of the Committee for Promoting a Peaceful Society extend only so far as Section 6 (1) confers them. That is a power to determine conclusively cases in which it is disputed whether there was a political motivation; cases in which an application has been made under Section 6 (2); and cases of children and young persons which do not fall within the amnesty but where a rehabilitation plan is sought under Section 11. It is not a power conferred by the Act to serve as a mechanism for ordering the termination of proceedings and the striking of cases from the docket — which is the court’s own power under Section 8, and which the court should be able to exercise itself in order to bring proceedings to an end promptly.

Further, on examining the consideration of the Bill by the House of Representatives’ ad hoc committee on the Bill, on 11 September 2025, it appears that the text of what is now Section 7 (formerly draft Section 6) originally provided:

“…this being as from the date on which the Committee for Promoting a Peaceful Society resolves that the person is relieved from being an offender under this Act.”

ทั้งนี้ นับแต่วันที่คณะกรรมการสร้างเสริมสังคมสันติสุขมีมติเห็นชอบให้ผู้นั้นพ้นจากการเป็นผู้กระทำความผิดตามพระราชบัญญัตินี้เป็นต้นไป

The committee members considering the Bill took the view that once the Act came into force it should take effect immediately, without waiting for the Committee to pass a resolution. The committee accordingly resolved to delete that text. It should therefore be interpreted that action under Section 8 of this Act must take effect immediately, without any need to wait for a resolution of the Committee for Promoting a Peaceful Society in each individual case.

Finally, as to the process of establishing the Committee for Promoting a Peaceful Society, for which the Act sets a time frame requiring the first meeting to be held within thirty days from the date the Act comes into force — that is, by 22 September 2026 — to this day, as regards the seats for qualified persons and experts, which the Act requires to be approved by the government whip, the opposition whip, the meeting of the Council of University Presidents of Thailand, and the President of the House of Representatives, there is still no clarity as to the selection process, nor has any list of names or any account of the selection process been disclosed to the public.

The situation of the political amnesty therefore remains to be monitored — both as regards the cases being dealt with in the justice process, and as regards the operations of the Committee.

Amnesty Article 112 Freedom of assembly freedom of expression

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