Nearly 60 years ago, the 'Seri Thai' resistance fighters who fought against the Japanese occupiers in Thailand during the Second World War will at last to gain recognition from the city of Bangkok which once officially despised them.

Khun Nikom Wairatpanich, the director of the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration Office of Social Welfare (BMA), said that in recognition of the vital role that the 'Seri Thai' resistance movement had played in Thailand during the Second World War, the BMA would turn the Seri Thai monument which was build in the year 2000, into a library and museum for the general Thai public.

While the library would help instill a love of reading among the public, the new museum would display exhibitions on the background of the 'Seri Thai' movement in Thailand and the role played by the late elder statesman Pridi Phanomyong, he said, adding that the new museum in Bangkok would also act as a local history museum for the Bung Keum area of the capital.

Dr. Pridi Phanomyong took part in the revolution that changed Thailand from a absolute monarchy to a constitutional monarchy almost a century ago. He was the founder of the Thammasat university, being the first liberal university after the revolution.

The building will be officially opened by Deputy Prime Minister Gen. Chavalit Yongchaiyudh on 16 August 2003.