BANGKOK (AFP) - A Thai court  Wednesday ordered thousands of protesters to leave the main government complex and issued arrest warrants for their leaders, ratcheting up the pressure to end the two-day standoff. But as riot police stood by, the demonstrators vowed to stay inside the Government House compound until Prime Minister Samak Sundaravej bows to their demands to step down. Thailand's Civil Court granted a government request for a ruling ordering five protest leaders and their spokesperson to end the siege, deputy national police spokesman Major General Surapol Tuanthong said late Wednesday. But members of the People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD) swiftly said they would not comply. "We have discussed this and it is necessary that we have to defy (the order)," Samran Rodphet, one of the protest speakers, told the crowds. "We have to fight so that our mission will be complete. We would like to ask the mercy from the court to let us do our mission to restore the nation." The Criminal Court earlier issued arrest warrants for nine members of PAD, but police have yet to act on the warrants and are standing by at Govt House. Despite government pleas, the threat of arrest, and even the onset of a tropical rainstorm, protest leaders refused to budge. Hundreds of protesters briefly formed a human shield around the PAD's most vocal leaders - media tycoon Sondhi Limthongkul and retired general Chamlong Srimuang - who sat on the ground in t-shirts reading "Fight for the king." Small scuffles broke out between police and protesters early Wednesday, but for most of the day the police deployed to the compound, some armed with batons and shields, kept away from the demonstrators. One police officer who refused to be named said 2,000 police were deployed outside Government House, while 500 were inside. Police earlier estimated that 14,000 protesters had flooded the compound. The PAD movement, which has been protesting since May, says Samak is a proxy running the country on behalf of former premier Thaksin Shinawatra, who was ousted in a 2006 coup and is barred from holding office.