Thai protesters chant slogans during a protest outside parliament Monday in Bangkok. (Sakchai Lalit/Associated Press)

Thousands of demonstrators surrounded Thailand's parliament Monday, demanding the new government dissolve the legislature and call general elections on the same day it was scheduled to deliver its first policy speech.

Calling themselves the Democratic Alliance against Dictatorship, the protesters have threatened to occupy the grounds of parliament until an election is called.

"If they [lawmakers] want to go in, they have to walk through us, including the prime minister," one of the protest leaders, Chatuporn Prompan, told reporters outside the parliament compound where demonstrators spent the night.

The government has agreed to postpone its policy address until Tuesday or Wednesday, newly appointed Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva said Monday, in an attempt to avoid the kinds of demonstrations that crippled parts of the country last month.

"We will keep negotiating and mediating," Abhisit said. "I beg everyone, including all the lawmakers and officials, to dedicate our holiday for the country in order to move our country forward."

Abhisit, 44, was voted to power by the country's parliament earlier this month after the People's Power Party was ousted by a court ruling that found it guilty of electoral fraud in last year's elections. Abhisit is the first opponent of ex-prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra to take power since 2006.

Thai protesters, supporters of exiled former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, demonstrate against Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva outside parliament on Monday. (Sakchai Lalit/Associated Press)

Largely Thaksin supporters, demonstrators on Monday accused Abhisit and his Democrat Party of seizing power through a kind of coup d'etat, saying the court ruling was delivered under pressure from the military and other powerful forces.

"We are here for democracy," said Narumol Thanakarnpanich, 53, a university professor from Bangkok. "We want a new government."

Turmoil feared

The demonstration has raised fears Thailand could once again descend into the kind of turmoil that gripped the country at the end of November, when anti-Thaskin protesters, angry at the exiled former leader's perceived influence in the PPP, stormed the country's largest airport in an eight-day siege.

Thaksin was overthrown by a coup in 2006, and has since lived in self-imposed exile, appearing most recently in Bali. A Thai court in October convicted the former prime minister in absentia of violating a conflict-of-interest law while in office and sentenced him to two years in prison.

Abhisit's new government is required by law to announce its policies by Jan. 7, although some legal experts suggested the government could lobby for an extension because of the protests.

Lawmakers will attempt to enter the parliament in the days to come by negotiating with demonstrators and not through the use of force, Deputy Prime Minister Suthep Thaugsuban said.

"We wish to deliver the policy statements before the end of the year," he said.

Two people died and hundreds were injured during street clashes between police and protesters —many of whom had taken over the prime minister's residence — outside parliament in October.

With files from the Associated Press