Thaksin Shinawatra, the former prime minister, remains the focus of intense political attention despite living abroad for more than 17 years. Reflecting back 23 years ago, during his time as Thailand's top leader, there were rumors of four assassination plots against him, including a transnational drug cartel setting an 80 million baht bounty. Each incident has since become historic.
Many believe the assassination attempts on national leader Thaksin Shinawatra, while he was prime minister, truly occurred. Yet many others have "never believed" these claims when looking back at the four reported assassination attempts against the former prime minister.
The first incident occurred on 3 Mar 2001, when an unexpected explosion damaged a Thai Airways Boeing 737-400, registration HS-TDC, en route from Bangkok to Chiang Mai, where the former prime minister's party was traveling. Just minutes before takeoff, the plane caught fire and was severely damaged, resulting in one death. Afterward, the former prime minister stated that officials' reports strongly suggested the cause was a bomb planted beneath the plane, in the VIP seating area.
"This was an attack, not terrorism. It's unclear who was targeted. Whoever did this was reckless—there's no need to do this to the prime minister; whoever it was, the country suffers," Thaksin said at that time.
Subsequently, the Royal Thai Police established an investigative committee led by Deputy Commissioner-General Police General San Sarutanon, amid rumors of sabotage by international terrorists or drug trafficking organizations.
The investigation proceeded intensively. On 5 Mar 2001, the committee headed by Police General San concluded it was definitely a bombing, likely involving C-4 explosives after traces of RDX—a component of C-4—were found scattered. They explained the bomb was probably detonated using a timer device assembled from a watch, though no remnants of this device were recovered at the scene.
The final investigation by the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), a global aviation authority, determined the cause was an accident due to air conditioning operation during refueling. A joint statement by the Thai government and NTSB concluded that heat from the cooling device caused the fuel tank above it to explode. Some parties regarded this incident as a cover-up to divert attention from the "honest fault" in the "stock hiding" scandal.
The second incident occurred in 2003 during the drug war crackdown, when news spread that the "Red Wa" group placed an 80 million baht bounty on Thaksin for his anti-drug policies that disrupted their profits. As a result, the former prime minister had to switch his official vehicle to an armored van and ordered enhanced security, increasing protection vehicles and a heavily armed assassination response team.
The third and most famous incident happened on 24 Aug 2006. Lieutenant Colonel Thawatchai Klinchana, a soldier assigned to the Internal Security Operations Command, was arrested driving a Daewoo car carrying explosives parked near Bang Phlat intersection. TNT and C-4 explosives were tied together in the car trunk with a destructive radius of at least one kilometer near Thaksin's residence on Charansanitwong 69 Road, along the prime minister’s motorcade route. However, security guards discovered it in time.
Government authorities concluded this was a targeted assassination attempt on Thaksin. The suspect was charged with jointly transporting and possessing explosives without permission. Many viewed this as more of a "carbon copy" than a genuine "car bomb".
The fourth incident occurred during Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej's administration, after Thaksin had returned home and paid respects to his homeland before requesting court permission to travel abroad for the Olympic Games in Beijing, People's Republic of China, from which he never returned. Thaksin's supporters uniformly reported a planned attack by certain parties, citing "snipers" that compelled him to leave the country again.
These past incidents reveal the tumultuous times former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra endured before living abroad for 15 years. Upon his latest return to Thailand and after his sentence completion, he once again became a focal figure, advising his youngest daughter, Paethongtarn Shinawatra, who is Thailand's 31st prime minister.