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Friday September 29, 11:16 AM Retired general picked as Thai new PM as US cuts off military aid Photo: AFP Click to enlarge BANGKOK (AFP) - Thailand's junta has chosen General Surayud Chulanont, a former head of the military, to succeed overthrown prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, the website of state-run Radio Thailand reports. The website quoted Thailand's auditor general Jaruvan Maintaka as telling reporters that Surayud, 63, was the generals' choice. "It is quite certain," she said. "General Surayud is the most suitable for the job, given his qualification and his seniority," she said, according to Radio Thailand, which is run by the government's public relations department. The generals are expected Sunday to formally announce a new prime minister after ousting Thaksin in a bloodless coup on September 19. Thailand's media Friday all tipped Surayud, who is a senior royal advisor, but there was no official confirmation. "Conclusion: Surayud, New Prime Minister," read the headline of Thailand's top-selling daily, Thairath. The English-language daily Nation also said Surayud was "the most suitable choice in the current situation," while the Bangkok Post said the military had asked Surayud to serve as interim prime minister. A source close to coup leader General Sonthi Boonyaratglin told the Bangkok Post that Sonthi had asked Surayud "if he was ready to take the post if nominated." Junta spokesman Palangoon Klaharn would not confirm or deny the reports. "It's just news. The name of a new prime minister should be announced after the endorsement of the constitution, which has not happened yet," he said. The United States has stripped millions of dollars in military aid from its ally Thailand, in protest at the coup. The sanctions jolted years of close links between Thai and US forces in the Asia-Pacific, which co-hosts the region's biggest annual American war games. But some aid deemed crucial to US national security was spared, notably in the field of counterterrorism, in which the kingdom has emerged as a low-key, yet valued partner in the US battle against Al-Qaeda. "In response to the military coup on September 19 in Thailand, the United States has suspended almost 24 million dollars of assistance to the Thai government," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said. The aid cutoff involved foreign military financing, international military education and training, and peacekeeping operations. "The United States continues to urge a rapid return to democratic rule and early elections in Thailand," McCormack said. "We look forward to being able to reinstate these programs after a democratically elected government takes office," he said. The sanctions were imposed automatically under a US law which forbids assistance to the government of a country where an elected leader has been deposed in a coup. But using a waiver, Washington will maintain 9.77 million dollars in aid to Thailand deemed to be in US national interests, focusing on counter-terrorism, combating weapons of mass destruction and fighting communicable diseases. The United States had previously condemned the coup and called on the generals to call elections before their one-year deadline. Official US military trips to Thailand had previously been suspended and all temporary defense duties in Thailand frozen, according to Stars and Stripes, a daily newspaper published for the US military. US military personnel in Thailand on temporary orders have been recalled, it said. The White House has also hinted that so far inconclusive talks with Bangkok on a free trade agreement might also depend on a return to democratic rule. Thailand's military rulers said earlier Thursday they had selected a new prime minister to be unveiled at the weekend, but refused to say when they would lift martial law and pull troops off the streets. Thailand is a US diplomatic and non-NATO ally and has been a voice for democratic reform in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), which also includes several totalitarian states. The fate was also unclear of the next annual "Cobra Gold" live-fire exercise, the largest US war games in Asia, which the United States hosts along with Thailand. The exercises, launched 25 years ago and originally limited to US and Thai troops, has been expanded in recent years to include an anti-terror component. Thailand has also played an important role in the US "war on terror" launched after the September 11, 2001 attacks. Hambali, leader of the Al-Qaeda-affiliated Southeast Asian terror group Jemaah Islamiya, was captured in the country in August 2003. But Thailand has denied reports in the US media that it was one of the sites for the CIA's secret prisons, now emptied, for top Al-Qaeda suspects. In recent weeks, the United States had registered concern at an insurgency raging in the Muslim-majority south of the mainly Buddhist kingdom, fearing it could feed into Southeast Asia's Al-Qaeda-linked terror networks.