BANGKOK (New York Times) — Thailand’s prime minister, Abhisit Vejjajiva, met on Sunday with leaders of a mass anti-government demonstration, the first major effort to defuse the street protests since they began two weeks ago.

The meeting between three red-shirted protest leaders and three government officials, including Mr. Abhisit, was broadcast live on the country’s main television channels, an unusual face-off between hardened political rivals.
“Our request is simple and direct: Dissolve Parliament for the people to decide again,” Veera Muksikapong, a protest leader, said in comments translated by The Associated Press.
The talks came amid a spate of mysterious grenade attacks in the capital that injured a number of soldiers and increasingly assertive moves by an estimated 100,000 demonstrators, who say the government is illegitimate partly because the coalition was brokered by the military.
The AP reported that the two sides agreed to meet again Monday.
Protest leaders on Saturday demanded that thousands of military personnel leave makeshift bases around the streets where demonstrators have camped out for the past two weeks; the military complied with most of the demands.
The three protest leaders spoke politely in the meeting Sunday, patiently jotting down notes as the prime minister answered, a contrast with the fiery speeches they have given in recent weeks when they denounced Mr. Abhisit as a puppet of the elite and military. The room was quiet enough to hear water being poured in a glass. Attendants brought snacks and hot drinks.
The prime minister, looking uncomfortable at times, said he would “make a decision based on a consensus from the entire country” and questioned whether calling for new elections would solve the country’s four-year-old political crisis.
The protesters, many of whom are supporters of Thaksin Shinawatra, the prime minister removed in a 2006 military coup, are mainly from the poorer strata of society, including a large number of farmers. They criticize the influence of what they call the “aristocracy” and cite the coup and two court decisions that banned Thaksin-backed political parties as events that have stifled the voice of the majority of citizens.
Critics of the red shirts accuse them of being the foot soldiers of Mr. Thaksin, whose five years in power divided the nation. Judges have ruled that Mr. Thaksin used his power to advance his personal business interests.
Mr. Abhisit had initially refused on Sunday to meet with the protesters but changed his mind, “to bring back the peace and to avoid possible violence and confrontation,” an official said.