A 30-year-old man is facing 50 years in prison for social media posts deemed to criticise the Thai monarchy, the longest sentence given under the country’s stringent lèse-majesté law.

Mongkol Thirakot, an online clothing seller from the northern Chiang Rai province, was already facing 28 years in jail over comments he made on Facebook three years ago.

But on Thursday, an appeals court added a further 22 years to his sentence after finding him guilty of 11 more violations.

Under Thailand’s lèse majesté laws – often referred to as Article 112, the designation in the southeast Asian country’s criminal code – insulting the monarch carries a prison term of between three and 15 years for each offence. In general, differing posts or comments on social media are deemed separate incidents.

The law was briefly suspended when King Maha Vajiralongkorn’s reign began in 2019. But when unprecedented student-led protests kicked off three years ago and openly called for royal reforms, Article 112 was revived.

More than 260 activists have since been charged, according to Thai Lawyers for Human Rights. On Wednesday, a prominent activist and lawyer who led the protests and first called for a public discussion about the monarch, also had his prison sentence lengthened from four to eight years.

The lèse-majesté laws became a controversial issue in last year’s election, when the progressive Move Forward Party called for alterations to the legislation. In a surprise result, the youth-led group won the poll – yet it struggled to form a coalition government, in part because of this position.

Later this month, the Constitutional Court will rule on whether the party should be dissolved because of these calls to alter the lèse-majesté legislation.

The latest sentence is the “longest in the history of Article 112 cases,” Theeraphon Khoomsap, Mr Mongkol’s lawyer, told Reuters. Details of what the 30-year-old said have not been published.

The previous record ruling was in 2021, when retired circle servant Anchan Preelert was handed a 43 year sentence.