Phuketwan Monday Update
PHUKET residents who need to enter the five-kilometre security cordon around the Asean Regional Forum are advised to go to the Cherng Talay Wittayacom School, behind the temple on the road from the Heroines' Monument to Laguna Phuket, with passport, car or motorcycle documents and house papers.
Phuketwan Original Report on Saturday
PHUKET residents who live within five kilometres of Laguna Phuket and others who go within that zone to work are being issued with color-coded vehicle permit stickers, Phuketwan has learned.
About 40,000 vehicle registration permits are being issued by the Army's Internal Security Operations Command, Region 4, which now has control of the island under the Internal Security Act.
The issuing of the color-coded stickers was taking place from today through village leaders, or phuyaibaan, according to the Deputy Director of ISOC, Colonel Piyapan Wongjan.
Stickers will be needed so residents or visitors can proceed through the demarked five-kilometre zone during the period from July 17 to July 23, when the Asean Regional Forum and associated meetings will be held at the Sheraton Grande Laguna Phuket, one of seven branded hotels within the large Laguna Phuket complex.
Several hundred private properties are also part of the Laguna zone. The north of the island is especially popular with high-end expat property buyers.
Four colors are being used in the permits.
A green sticker will be for people working at Laguna or staying there as residents of properties; Chern Talay and Kamala sub-district residents will be issued with red stickers; residents of Mai Khao sub-district, Thepkasattri sub-district, Srisunthorn sub-district and Sakoo sub-district residents will be issued with blue stickers; people from areas outside the zone who need to go there will be issued with yellow stickers.
Car stickers are square, motorcycle stickers are triangular.
The traditional village leaders have responsibility for issuing the permits to all residents, including expats.
Those who wish to collect the permits directly can do so from the Cherng Talay Witayakom School, which is opposite the tessaban Cherng Talay local authority, in the main road running from the Heroines' Monument to Laguna.
Expats and Thai residents will need their passports or ID cards and house registration papers to obtain permits.
Colonel Piyapan said the stickers would be issued between now and the start of the 27-nation conference on Friday, July 17.
The stickers contain a bar code that can be checked on a computer database.
It was not clear who was responsible for informing people outside the Laguna Phuket zone about the need for the permit stickers.
Without a sticker, proceeding through the various checkpoints at five kilometres and three kilometres around the conference venue may become slow and laborious.
Phuketwan understands that people travelling along Thepkasattri Road, the main road between the Phuket International Airport and Phuket City, will not require a permit.
But anyone turning from the Heroines' Monument along the road towards Laguna, or coming north along the beach road from Patong towards Surin, will require a permit to pass.
All expats on Phuket are advised by Phuketwan to carry their passports everywhere on the island from Monday, July 13, to avoid problems.
Oblong blue stickers are also being handed out as souvenirs, marking the 42nd AMM/PMC 16th ARF and headed: ''The Royal Thai Government and the Thai People.''
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton heads a list of high-level visitors to Phuket from next week. Important regional security issues, including nuclear disarmament, are likely to be discussed, with representatives from North Korea and Burma attending.
Reuters news agency has reported that as many as 10,000 military could be involved in ensuring the island does not see a repetition of protests that stopped a similar Asean summit in Pattaya in April.
Tourism industry leaders have made the point that the presence of too much uniformed protection could convey the wrong impression about the holiday island and deter visitors from coming in future.
The Governor of Phuket, Wichai Praisa-nob has extracted promises from all key authorities and local organisations that there will not be street blockades, the usual form of public protest, while the conferences are being held.
Members of the red-shirt opposition movement, whose protests brought the Pattaya summit to a halt before meetings of national leaders could begin, have given similar assurances.
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