Thai protesters hold ground amid lockdown

Yesterday authorities began to cut power, public transport and some mobile phone services in the area, but music and speeches carried on from the Red Shirt stage and were relayed by sympathetic radio stations. In the morning some protesters were out early to extend their defences.

With the army expected to add more pressure on the demonstrators, and perhaps try to clear them, the Red Shirts suddenly found themselves without a key ally, a rogue general who served as their tactician for street confrontations.

Maj Gen Khattiya Sawasdiphol, better known by the nickname Seh Daeng, was shot in the head while talking to reporters just inside the Red Shirts' perimeter yesterday, about an hour after the government's lockdown was launched.

The hospital where Khattiya was taken said today he was unlikely to survive. The attacker was not known.

Several small street battles later saw one man killed and 11 other people wounded. Protesters stopped police trucks and forced them to turn back. They hurled rocks at soldiers, who responded by firing live ammunition, according to an Associated Press cameraman.

Gunfire - most if not all from soldiers - and several small explosions were heard well into the night.

The skirmishes took place along the southern end of the zone held by the Red Shirts, while their main rally site at the north end was mostly undisturbed. About 10,000 protesters were believed by the government to be in the area.

The Red Shirts have turned a square-mile area in the posh Rajprasong neighbourhood into a sprawling camp, with portable toilets, free food and a stage from which their leaders deliver daily anti-government diatribes.

About 90 minutes before he was shot, Khattiya, 59, gave interviews to foreign reporters, saying he anticipated a military crackdown soon.

Asked if troops shot Khattiya, government spokesman Panitan Wattanayagorn refused to give a direct answer. "The operation by authorities was according to international standards and law. So far, we have not found any actions by the authorities that went beyond that," he said.

The government had labelled Khattiya a terrorist and a mastermind behind some of the violence.

Khattiya helped build the Red Shirt barricades of sharpened bamboo stakes and tyres around the protest area, was accused of creating a paramilitary force among the protesters and had vowed to fight the army if it launched a crackdown.

He bitterly opposed reconciling with the government and had become critical of Red Shirt leaders, some of whom had wanted to accept a compromise.

Killed in the later fighting was Chartchai Bualao, 25, who was shot in the eye, according to the government's medical emergency centre. At least seven other people were injured.

The Red Shirts believe prime minister Abhisit Vejjajiva's coalition government came to power illegitimately through manipulation of the courts and the backing of the powerful military. They are demanding he dissolve parliament and call new elections.

Tens of thousands of Red Shirts streamed into the capital on March 12 and occupied the historic central area. An army attempt to clear them on April 10 led to clashes that killed 25 people and wounded more than 800. Another four people were killed in related violence in the following weeks.

Yesterday the government extended a state of emergency to cover 17 of Thailand's 76 provinces to prevent more people from joining the protesters in the capital.

The decree gives the army broad powers to deal with protesters and places restrictions on civil liberties.

The protesters include many supporters of former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, a populist leader accused of corruption and abuse of power and ousted in a 2006 military coup.

A group of protesters captured and vandalised two military water cannon trucks today, ripping the cannon from its moorings and using its plastic barrel to shoot firecrackers.