BANGKOK (Reuters) - Former Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra on Tuesday questioned a move by Thailand’s military government to freeze her assets in relation to a $1-billion fine it imposed over her government’s rice buying scheme.

FILE PHOTO: Ousted former Thai prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra greets supporters as she arrives at the Supreme Court in Bangkok, Thailand, July 21, 2017. REUTERS/Athit Perawongmetha/File photo

Yingluck, whose administration was ousted in a 2014 coup, was banned from politics for five years in 2015 after a military-appointed legislature found her guilty of mismanaging the rice scheme.

Yingluck denies she is guilty. Her supporters accuse her opponents of political persecution and the courts of bias in frequently ruling against Yingluck and her family members.

Last year, a state-appointed committee recommended she pay a fine of 35 billion baht ($1 billion), or about a fifth of the 178 billion baht it said the schemes cost the state in 2012 and 2013.

The justice ministry on Monday began freezing several of her bank accounts.

She had filed a court petition to revoke the action to freeze her bank accounts, saying the move was unlawful.

“The government has chosen to go ahead with it because they think they have the power to do whatever they want, without even waiting on the court’s decision on my injunction request,” Yingluck wrote on her official Facebook page, vowing to continue the fight to prove her innocence.

Yingluck is fighting a criminal charge of alleged negligence over the rice scheme, with the Supreme Court due to give its verdict on Aug. 25.

“This action creates a condition that could influence the Supreme Court decision on the rice case,” Yingluck wrote, referring to the criminal case.

Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha warned Yingluck’s supporters against gathering outside the court for the verdict.

“If people want to come on their own, then that’s OK, but enticing others is illegal,” he added.

Yingluck’s Puea Thai Party swept to power in 2011 in part by appealing to rural voters with the rice buying scheme, which eventually saw her government buy rice from farmers at up to 50 percent above market prices.

It thus amassed grain stockpiles of 18 million tonnes, which the military government has been trying to offload since 2014.

The military-backed Bangkok establishment, which took part in protests in 2013/14 that helped to overthrow the Yingluck government, called the subsidies wasteful and corrupt.

Her supporters say the ruling junta has deliberately targeted Yingluck and wants to silence her family’s political machine.

Voters in the northeast told Reuters this month that the trial had failed to break the family political machine, however. [L3N1K704X]

Yingluck will deliver her closing statement in the criminal case next week.