A disabled Danish veteran who once visited Thailand on a relief mission after the 2004 tsunami says he was knocked out of his wheelchair and beaten on Phuket in broad daylight.
Frederik Aakerlund, 48, now a champion disabled surfer, was released from Patong Hospital on Friday after two months of recovery there, according to an interview in Phuketwan.
Aakerlund, who lost both of his legs on active duty in 2007, said he was out looking for waves early on a holiday morning about two months ago when he was randomly accosted by a group of men.
”This day I’m in between some cars, trying to cross from the beach side of the road to the other side,” he said in the interview. ”Five or six guys come up to me and play this game of pushing me from one to the other ‘I asked them to stop because my sports wheelchair is unstable and can easily flip over. This is dangerous stuff. ‘Can you please stop this?’”
The men didn’t desist.
”One of them got really aggressive and said ‘You cannot talk like that to us. Oh you fucking tourists.’ He pushed me really hard and I fell out of the wheelchair,” he recounted. ”When I was on the ground the first man kicked me. Then they all kicked me. I was also afraid they might have knives.”
It seems Aakerlund may not have filed a complaint at the time, as police reportedly said too much time had passed to recover any security footage.
Although the men eventually left him lying and took his money, Aakerlund said he didn’t think robbery was the motive.
”My reason for coming to Phuket was to take disabled and blind Thai children out on the water. That’s now on hold. I was supposed to go to the world surfing championships in May, That will go on hold now too.”
Photo: Wet Wheels Surfer
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