PHUKET: In sweeping changes to assert its complete control in Thailand, the military late today stood down the country's remaining Senators along with the national police chief, the head of the Department of Special Investigation, and the permanent secretary of the Defence Ministry.

The announcements followed the resumption of a ban on a number of key television channels distributed via True Vision, including the BBC, Aljazeera and Australia Network.

A 10pm-5am curfew was imposed tonight for the third night straight across all of Thailand, including tourist destinations such as Phuket, Phang Nga and Krabi, following the coup on Thursday by General Prayuth Chan-ocha.

Groups of political leaders remain in detention tonight including former Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra.

Her brother Thaksin Shinawatra, the most powerful politician of the century in Thailand, continues to exert influence over the way the country is run, despite his choice of self-imposed exile because of a corruption conviction.

Most of the actions by General Prayuth since the imposition of military rule on Tuesday and its elevation to a full coup on Thursday appear to target the Shinawatra family and its supporters.

Arrests involving arms caches are believed to have taken place today across Thailand's northern and north-eastern provinces where many of Mr Thaksin's supporters live and work.

Tomorrow the editors of 18 leading Thai-language and English-language newspapers are being called to the Army Club in Bangkok to hear what the general has to say about media coverage.

Today there are two distinct Thailands: coup Thailand where a massive political endgame is being played out, involving the future of the country and who might eventually be able to reasonably rule it, and normal Thailand, where, apart from the 10pm curfew, there are few signs of change.

From the other, more normal Thailand comes a letter from a resort manager on Phuket telling guests that ''all businesses, banks, airports, shopping centres, etc are operating as usual.''

''Over the past seven months Bangkok has seen a big amount of violence and clashes between the opposing sides,'' the manager's letter says. ''Phuket was never affected.

''We have monitored Phuket closely over the past three days and have not found any increase in security forces on the island and business is absolutely as usual.

''As much as a coup d'etat announcement might scare Western people, Thailand has had many of them, the latest in 2006, which was a non-violent coup, same as what we can witness today.''

The Thai Journalists Association, the Press Council of Thailand, the Thai Broadcast Journalists and the News Broadcasting Council of Thailand called on the National Peace and Order Maintaining Council today to lift restrictive bans on media.

The newspapers joining talks tomorrow are: Bangkokbiznews, Khaosod, Komchadluek, Dailynews, Thairath, Naewna, Banmuang, Bangkok Post, Bangkok Today, Prachachat, Manager, Pimthaionline, Thanonline, Post Today, Matichon, Daily World Today, Siamrath.

The TV channels banned again at 2.40pm today: BBC, CNN, Phoenix, CNBC, Bloomberg, Aljazeera, CCTV, NHK Premium, TV5, YTN, Australia Network, NHK World, Dutch TV.