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"If they still continue to exploit their fellow human beings they should not be given any licences to operate businesses in Thailand and they must receive the punishment they deserve," said junta leader Prayuth Chan-ocha.

Seafood processed in Thai factories is a multibillion-dollar industry and one of the country's top export earners.

However, as Thailand's military-appointed government laid out new laws targeting human trafficking, the Royal Thai Navy has pressed ahead with criminal proceedings that began a year ago against Australian journalist Alan Morison and his Thai colleague Chutima Sidasathian for reporting on trafficking of ethnic Rohingya boat people.

On Wednesday, King Bhumibol Adulyadej gave his much-expected rubber stamp to General Prayuth Chan-ocha’s decision to invoke Article 44 of the nation’s interim constitution, by which “acts deemed harmful to national peace and stability” may be curbed.

Crusading Phuketwan website shut down as journalists face Thai court...
Morison, a former senior Age editor, and Chutima face up to seven years' jail on charges that relate to a single paragraph republished in Phuketwan in July 2013 from a Reuters report on Rohingya refugees.

Reuters subsequently won a Pulitzer prize for its reporting on Rohingya that included the paragraph.

But the Royal Thai Navy only laid charges over the Phuketwan republication, prompting widespread criticism that it has singled out a small independent news outlet that had broken numerous stories on the plight of the Rohingyas over seven years...

Eight human rights groups, including Human Rights Watch and Amnesty, and journalist groups last week appealed to Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha to drop the charges, saying in a joint letter the legal action threatens the right to freedom of opinion and expression that is supposed to be the bedrock of Thailand's democratic society.

A court hearing for an Australian website editor and his colleague accused of defaming Thai naval officers by alleging their involvement with human traffickers ended on Thursday, with the prosecution absent for two out of three days of the trial.

“It could go one way or another,” defendant Alan Morison told the Guardian over the telephone after leaving the courtroom in Phuket in southern Thailand.

A judge has until 1 September to decide on the verdict on Morison, 67, editor of the independent news website Phuketwan, and Thai reporter Chutima Sidasathian.

On Tuesday, the prosecution made its case against the two for criminal defamation and on charges under the Computer Crime Act, which bans online material considered a threat to national security. On Wednesday and Thursday, the defence called witnesses but the prosecution did not appear to cross-examine.

“It could be that they are confident that they are going to win the case on the basis of the prosecution witnesses. Or it’s a tacit acknowledgement that they don’t have a case,” Morison said. The hearing ended in the early afternoon on Thursday.

An Australian editor and his Thai reporter colleague were found not guilty on Tuesday of criminal defamation for reporting on the alleged involvement of Thai naval officers in the trafficking of Burmese Rohingya refugees.

Alan Morison, editor of independent news website Phuketwan, and reporter Chutima Sidasathian faced up to seven years in jail and thousands of US dollars in fines...

Phil Robertson, deputy director for the Asia division of Human Rights Watch, said ahead of the verdict that the “case should have never been brought to trial in the first place, and the fact that it was shows this Thai government’s total lack of concern for media freedom”.

He added: “This whole episode shows a fundamental lack of understanding among Thai government and military officials about what a free press is really about and the role it plays in democratic society.”