Word: airports
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...local policeman begins to yell at the top of his voice at a knot of uncomprehending Italian journalists. Li's and Versace's entourages make time-out gestures at each other, cutting the visit short and bundling everyone into the SUVs for the long drive back to Chengdu airport and the evening flight to Beijing. It has been an exhausting business, spending a day in Li's wake. "Oh this is nothing," laughs his personal videographer. "You should have seen the crowds when we were in Shanghai...
...Thailand abandoned its traditional hospitality when antigovernment agitators swarmed Bangkok's international airport, grounding one of Asia's busiest air hubs. "Basically, we are hostages," said Irish tourist Dermuid McAnoy, expressing almost as much frustration toward the protesters as toward airline staff, who seemed to melt away as soon as the crowds armed with bamboo sticks and iron bars appeared. "Yes, we can leave, but we have no place to go."(See pictures from the Thai protests...
...Thailand's airport takeover marked an ominous turning point in a months-long political battle that has morphed from sideshow farce to center-stage emergency. "When you close down the gateway to the country, then you have reached the point of a national crisis," says Panitan Wattanayagorn, a national-security expert at Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok. "In fact, because this now affects Thailand's connection to the wider world, it is becoming an international crisis...
...which has masterminded 18 coups since Thailand's absolute monarchy was abolished in 1932, will intervene again to contain anarchy and set up a new, Thaksin-free regime. But shortly after the air terminal takeover, the army publicly quashed putsch rumors and called for the PAD to leave the airport. (Army chief Anupong Paochinda did, however, urge Somchai to "return the power to the people" by calling fresh elections.) The military's reluctance to let tanks roll on the streets presumably derives from the fact that its last political interference didn't pan out. True, Thaksin - a nemesis...
...Back at the Bangkok airport, PAD executive Puchong Tirawatana continued to stoke antigovernment ire. "This is all because of one man, Thaksin Shinawatra," he said, as a yellow-hued sea of protesters armed with plastic hand-clappers milled around near him. "[Thaksin is] a selfish criminal who is willing to destroy the country for his own personal gain. I'm really worried that violence will increase and the country will be in a civil war." Then, in a marked change of tone, Puchong apologized for the siege that had stranded thousands of tourists in an airport whose Thai name, Suvarnabhumi...