A special team has been given a week to go through files on more than 2,500 people killed this year and report back

By Nirmal Ghosh

BANGKOK - The Royal Thai Police said yesterday that it had launched an investigation into the more than 2,500 killings that took place in the early stages of the government's controversial 10-month 'war on drugs'.

-- AFP The probe was triggered by King Bhumibol Adulyadej's annual birthday speech broadcast live over radio, it added.

The monarch had wanted an explanation for the deaths that had taken place.

Police Major General Pongsapat Pongcharoen said that a special police team had been set up to investigate all the killings that took place in the country from Feb 1 to April 30 this year.

The team has seven days to report back with the findings.

All police agencies have been instructed to give it their fullest cooperation.

He said officers plan to reopen the files on all of the cases and investigate.

Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra launched his crackdown on the illicit drug trade in February after the King called for the nation's drug problems to be addressed during his birthday speech last year.

It was estimated then that about 5 per cent of Thais were regular users of methamphetamines or 'yaba' - the main focus of the crackdown.

As the campaign continued, the gung-ho tactics of the police against drug criminals left a bloody trail of bodies - among them those of innocent bystanders.

Questions were raised at home and abroad about violation of human rights in the campaign.

Police claimed that most of the dead were traffickers killed by drug dealers who were afraid that they would expose them and their modus operandi.

Others were killed by police acting in self-defence, they added.

Mr Thaksin has consistently rejected allegations of extra-judicial executions by the police.

At a ceremony on Thursday during which he declared the war on drugs had been successful, he said he was not sorry to see 'enemies of the nation' dead or jailed.

But in an address on Thursday night, on the eve of his 76th birthday, the King urged the Thai Prime Minister to publish the results of the investigations.

'If the matter is not clarified, many people will blame the Prime Minister,' he said.

'The findings should be made available to the public and to the international community.'

'It is a good thing to suppress drugs,' the King said in his 90-minute televised speech, delivered to a select audience of Cabinet members, top government officials and diplomats at the Chitralada Palace.

'Most of the dead were people who had killed one another, people who did the trafficking...'

But he added: 'The government must take responsibility by clarifying the causes of the deaths.'

In his speech, King Bhumibol praised the Prime Minister but at the same time advised that he exercise moderation, openness and more tolerance towards criticism.

He said: 'When I was 40-50 years old, my mother told me sometimes that I was great but she always added that I must not forget myself.

'She said I must not float and Bhumibol means that I had to keep my feet on the ground.'

'She said when I did something good, it's all right to know what I did but I should not be too proud.'

He also said that Mr Thaksin should 'read newspapers - and let them write'.

There has been growing unease in media and intellectual circles about what is perceived as the government's intolerance of criticism.

The Thaksin administration is riding on a wave of popularity and has won praise for lifting Thailand out of economic gloom.

But ruling party members have periodically lashed out at academics and non-government organisations critical of government policies.