Thai police were talking with protesters blockading Bangkok's airports on Friday, a senior police officer said, and will move against them if negotiations fail to end the siege.

"We are asking them to allow the airport to resume operations," Lieutenant-General Suchart Muenkaew, the chief police negotiator at Don Muang airport, told reporters. "We will keep talking, but if it fails we will take other steps. The last step will be to disperse them."

The siege by People's Alliance of Democracy (PAD) protesters at Don Muang and Suvarnabhumi International Airport has cut the Thai capital's air links to the world, leaving thousands stranded and hurting the tourist-dependent economy.

The University of the Thai Chamber of Commerce said if the political turmoil and airport closures go on for another month, it would cost the economy up to 215 billion baht ($6 billion).

Declaring a state of emergency at the airports from the government stronghold of Chiang Mai, 700 km (400 miles) north of Bangkok, Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat said the export- and tourism-driven economy could not tolerate further disruption.

But with security forces reluctant to act and the protesters insisting they'll stay out until the government falls, the standoff could continue.

PAD guards had set up roadblocks on the main expressway to the airport and were stopping all cars and checking passengers and trunk compartments.

"We will not leave. We will use human shields against the police if they try to disperse us," PAD leader Suriyasai Katasila told Reuters.

Thailand's three-year-old political crisis has deepened dramatically since the PAD began a "final battle" on Monday to unseat a government it accuses of being a pawn of former leader Thaksin Shinawatra, ousted in a 2006 coup. Somchai is Thaksin's brother-in-law.

Pressure has built on the army to step in since Somchai rejected military calls to quit, but pro-government forces threaten to take up arms if the elected administration is ousted, raising fears of major civil unrest.

Agencies

(China Daily 11/29/2008 page11)