Today has proven to be a sad day for Thailand.

The military rolled into the Silom this morning and forced their way through the protesters' barricades while pockets of resistance popped up around the city.

At about 1pm the leaders of the Reds surrendered to the police and asked their followers to stop the protests as the body count was rising and they did not want anymore bloodshed.

Unfortunately the surrendering of their leaders made the most militant of the protesters even more defiant, now fuelled by their anger and the feeling that they had been abandoned. So they set fire to the city. The following is a list of buildings and areas that are currently on fire or have already been burned. Keep in mind that it is only 4:30pm...the real burning started at about 1:30pm

• Central World Shopping Centre has apparently been set on fire and looted and continues to burn now
• Siam Center and theatre. The Theatre is apparently burnt to the ground
• Channel 3 news headquarters
• The Thailand stock exchange building is on fire
• The intersection near the Central Lad Prao is burning
• Areas in Silom, Din Daeng, Bon Kai, and Rama 4, Sukhumvit and Ekkamai continue to burn
• There have been report that Pratinam shopping centre is also on fire
• The Tesco Lotus in On Nut has been bombed
• There is gunfire outside and around many banks, government offices and shopping centres.
• All staff from the Bangkok Post and The Nation newspapers were evacuated after Red shirts warned of attacks because of biased media reports

For those of you who don't live here or are not familiar with Bangkok, these are massive shopping complexes. Central World is part of the 2nd largest shopping complex in Asia and the others take up blocks and blocks of the central shopping district. When I look out my window it looks like the whole city is ablaze.

An 8pm curfew has been imposed on all of Bangkok. School has been cancelled until next Monday. There have also been reports of violence and fires breaking out in Pattaya, Chiang Mai, Esan and Udon Thani.

It's a sad day indeed. Lets hope that this time Thailand learns from its mistakes...

J

Here are some pictures I took from my balcony at about 3pm