At least three explosions have rocked the main business district of Bangkok.

Hundreds of fully armed troops have been pouring into the area since Monday, in a bid to keep thousands of anti-government protesters at a nearby rally site from marching on the Thai capital’s economic centre.

A number of people have been carried off on stretchers.

Irish reporter Simon Roughneen is in Bangkok and says the scene there is tense.

“The main financial district in the capital where the Red Shirts were hoping to march into in the last few days, they haven’t been let by the army” he said.

“There have been a number of explosions; one up in the train station overhead, and another – which I think was an N79 grenade  fired into other protesters – on the other side of the intersection”.

“There’s a few casualties, there’s ambulances streaming away – I’ve seen six so far” he added.