BANGKOK - Protesters and the Thai government stepped back from the brink of all-out armed conflict on Friday as both sides offered hints of compromise a day after deadly grenade attacks hit Bangkok's business district. The red-shirted supporters of ousted former premier Thaksin Shinawatra said they will end a three-week occupation of Bangkok's ritzy shopping district if the government dissolved parliament and called elections in 30 days instead of immediately. It's unclear whether the military-backed government of embattled Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva would agree to that timetable, though analysts say he's running out of options after weeks of unrest by protesters who have gained a clear upper hand. "The government might have to agree to a three-month timeframe, but this doesn't mean this will ease the tensions," said Pitch Pongsawat, political scientist at Chulalongkorn University. "There doesn't seem to be any real control about what's been happening on the streets." The risk of violence remains high. Thousands of armed troops keep watch over red shirts at a city intersection. Royalist pro-government protesters often gather outside their barricade, sparking clashes in which both sides hurl bottles and insults. Among their new demands, the red shirts want Abhisit to begin an independent probe into a clash that killed 25 people and wounded more than 800 in a failed attempt to disperse the protesters on April 10, and said troops must withdraw from areas around their protest site. "The government must stop all threats against our movement," Weng Tojirakarn, a red shirt leader, said from a stage at their protest site in the heart of Bangkok's commercial district. The demands came shortly after army chief Anupong Paochinda offered an olive leaf of his own, telling commanders there would be no crackdown on the protesters camped out in the capital because it would do more harm than good.
