By Pisit Changplayngam
BANGKOK (Reuters) - Thai authorities will seek a court order on Monday to arrest leaders of tens of thousands of protesters occupying Bangkok's main shopping district, hoping to derail an increasingly bold four-week rally to force elections.
Despite repeated warnings they could face up to a year in jail, the red-shirted protesters occupied the area of upmarket department stores and luxury hotels for a second night on Sunday.
Thai stocks, which have climbed 81 percent over the past 12 months, looked set to open weaker in response.
"The impact on retail, hotel and tourism-related sectors seems unavoidable and we should see selling pressure in these sectors," said Chakkrit Charoenmetachai, an analyst with Globlex Securities. Tourism supports about 5 percent of the economy.
Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva has called the rally unlawful, but there has been no sign security forces would disperse the mostly rural and working class "red shirts," who say they will not leave until parliament is dissolved.
Deputy Prime Minister Suthep Thaugsuban said the government would seek a court order on Monday to arrest leaders of the rally, which he says violates Thailand's tough Internal Security Act imposed last month to maintain order during the protests.
"We have tried our best to be patient," he said.
The "red shirts," supporters of ousted premier Thaksin Shinawatra, have hinted they may expand their rally to another area of the city. They now occupy two areas: the shopping district and Phan Fah Bridge in Bangkok's old quarter.
"We will retain our current two protest stages. Whether we set up another will be dictated by the situation," Nattawut Saikua, a protest leader, told reporters on Sunday evening.
A decision on the next stage of the protest would be made at 10 a.m. (4 a.m. British time), he said.
Backed by Thailand's powerful military and royalist establishment, Abhisit said holding a peaceful poll now would be difficult, given the tensions, and he repeated his offer to dissolve parliament in December, a year early.
Analysts say Abhisit would probably lose an election if it were held now, raising investment risks in Southeast Asia's second-biggest economy following a $1.6 billion (1.05 billion pound) surge of foreign investment in Thai stocks over the past five weeks on expectations he would survive the showdown.
Economists also caution that continued political turmoil could hit confidence and investment, and might force the central bank to delay an expected interest-rate rise.
RETAILERS HIT
Raising fears of a blow to retail business, Central World, the second-largest shopping complex in Southeast Asia, and half a dozen other big malls remained shuttered for a second day.
Central World usually attracts 150,000 people a day, said Sakon Thavisin, a spokesman for its parent company, Central Pattana.
"The hardest hit are restaurants and food shops with stranded fresh food and perishable raw materials because the blockade is preventing vehicles from going in to pick them up," he said.
The "red shirts" say Abhisit has no popular mandate and came to power illegitimately, heading a coalition the military cobbled together after courts dissolved a pro-Thaksin party that led the previous government. Abhisit says he was voted into office by the same parliament that picked his Thaksin-allied predecessors.
At the centre of the impasse is Thaksin, a former telecoms tycoon seen as authoritarian and corrupt before he was ousted in a 2006 coup but a rallying symbol for the poor as the first Thai civilian leader to embrace rural voters in his 2001 election win.
Some fear a rippling impact on tourism ahead of Thailand's April 13-15 Songkran holidays. "This has affected the normal way of life," said Apichart Singka-aree, director and former president of the private Association of Thai Travel Agents.
"Out of some 100 previously booked flights for Chinese tourists to fly in for the Songkran festival, over 60 have been cancelled. We are trying to save the remaining 30-something flights," he told Reuters.
(Additional reporting by Ambika Ahuja and Vithoon Amorn; Writing by Jason Szep; Editing by Alan Raybould)
