Former interim Thai Prime Minister Niwatthamrong Boonsongpaisan is among
the latest batch of people that the military has released following
last week's coup, a military officer said Thursday.Also among the 31 people recently released was former Thai Foreign
Minister Surapong Tovichakchaikul, Col. Sirichan Ngathong told
reporters.The military had summoned, and in some cases detained, scores of political officials and other prominent figures after the May 22 coup,
which the military carried out after months of unrest that had
destabilized the elected government and caused outbursts of deadly
violence in Bangkok.But the sudden
intervention by the armed forces -- the latest in a series of coups that
have punctuated modern Thai history -- has been criticized by human
rights activists and foreign governments, including the United States. 
Small groups of
protesters also have gathered in Bangkok in recent days, with
demonstrators calling for democratic elections. But security forces
sealed off one of the main protest sites -- a monument -- on Thursday,
days after the officer who led the coup suggested that the military
wouldn't tolerate public displays of dissent indefinitely.Boonsongpaisan was
interim prime minister when the military conducted the coup. The
military, which tore up the country's constitution and declared martial
law, says it so far has summoned at least 280 people, and about 200 of
them -- including former Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra -- turned
themselves in. 
The military says it has
released about 155 people so far, including Yingluck, who was in office
when the current phase of political turmoil began in November.Yingluck, who was removed
from office by the courts earlier this month, was released from a
military facility over the weekend after she followed a summons to
report to military authorities on Friday.A military source said
Yingluck was asked to "help us maintain peace and order and not to get
involved with protesters or any political movement" and now has freedom
of movement and communication. But a close aide to Yingluck disagreed
with the assertion that she was free to move and communicate.
The military has said it
would impress upon the summoned people the negative consequences their
actions have had for the country in the sometimes bloody conflict of the
last seven months.
Detainees determined to
have no significant link to conflict and who find "common ground" for
the good of the country will be released, a military spokesman
previously said.
The recent unrest was driven by months of protests against Yingluck's government.
The protest leaders said
they wanted to rid Thailand of the influence of Yingluck and her
wealthy brother, the exiled former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra,
who was deposed in the country's last military coup in 2006.
The siblings' powerful
political movement, which has dominated elections for more than a
decade, draws its support from Thailand's populous rural regions in the
north and northeast.
But it is unpopular among the Bangkok elites, who accuse it of buying votes through ill-judged, populist policies.The protesters who
campaigned against Yingluck's government claimed Thailand needed reforms
to be imposed by an unelected council before any further elections
could take place.
With the military's
intervention, they appear to have gotten their wish, although some of
the protest leaders were taken into custody after the coup.On Monday, the officer
who led the coup, Gen. Prayuth Chan-ocha told reporters there was "no
set time period" for when new elections might be held, and he outlined
the steps he said his junta plan to take, including setting up a
committee to introduce reforms.
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