2 Army officers face severe punishment for conscript abuse
The officers subjected soldiers under their command to humiliating penalties, sparking outrage and prompting an investigation
Two non-commissioned officers at an Army post in Chiang Mai were found to have severely violated the code of discipline and are being detained for 45 days, an Army spokesman said on Wednesday.
Colonel Ritcha Suksuwannon, a deputy Army spokesman, told the press that the investigation into allegations that a unit
of conscripts had been far too severely punished at an Army unit in Chiang Mai’s Fang district has been completed.
The investigation was ordered after a woman said in a post on the Sai Mai Tong Rod (Survive) Facebook page on August 3 that an Army sergeant forced 10 conscripts to stand naked under the rain for six hours as punishment. She claimed the two officers were usually drunk when they made their conscripts undergo severe punishment.
Ritcha said the investigation had found that such excessive punishment had occurred twice this year, on March 5 and August 1.
On March 5, two non-commissioned Army officers had conscripts under their command stand naked in the rain for several hours as punishment after learning that some of them had sneaked out of the base to meet their love interests, Ritcha said.
Then on August 1, the same two non-commissioned officers ordered the conscripts under their command to undergo urine tests. One of the conscripts expressed dissatisfaction, while another could not urinate, Ritcha said. He added that the two officers then used violence against these two conscripts.
In light of this behaviour, he added that the Army believes these two officers had excessively punished the conscripts and were in violation of the Army regulations and discipline.
Hence, the Army ordered the two unit commanders to be returned to their barracks, where they will be detained in jail for 45 days. They will also be deprived of pension when they retire from the military, the spokesman said.
The Army chief has also ordered the commanders of the company and battalion to which the unit belongs to undergo 15 days of discipline training and grounding at the base, Ritcha added.
