After two Myanmar suspects named a Thai arms dealer in their plot to murder Myanmar’s ambassador to the United Nations (U.N) this weekend, the Royal Thai Police (RTP) has announced they will investigate if asked.
According to the Bangkok Post, Pol Col Kissana Phathanacharoen, deputy spokesperson for the RTP, said nobody in the United States has contacted the Royal Thai Police about the Thai arms dealer but, if this does happen, the RTP is ready to investigate.
The case hit international news headlines late last week when Manhattan federal prosecutors announced two men from Myanmar had been arrested due to their plan to murder Kyaw Moe Tun, Myanmar ambassador to the U.N.
Phyo Hein Htut, age 28, and Ye Hein Zaw, 20, told American prosecutors they had been contacted by the yet-unnamed Thai arms dealer and asked to hire people to attack Tun as a way to make him resign.
One of the ways they planned to do this was tamper with the tires on the ambassador’s car causing it to crash.
If he refused to resign after the accident, he was then to be murdered.
According to the pair, the arms dealer sells weapons to the Myanmar military, which overthrew the democratically elected government in early 2021.
That could suggest Myanmar’s military junta government instigated the plot to kill ambassador Kyaw Moe Tun.
The reason?
After the recent Myanmar military coup, Tun gave a speech at the United Nations in February this year asking for the world to condemn the military regime,
“We need further strongest possible action from the international community to immediately end the military coup, to stop oppressing the innocent people, to return the state power to the people and to restore the democracy.”
The new military government immediately fired him from his U.N. position.
Tun continues to serve as the Permanent Representative of Myanmar to the United Nations, however, after he wrote a letter to the General Assembly president and to the U.N’s current secretary general António Guterres stating he represents Myanmar’s legitimate government.