Word: thais
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...more than six decades, Thailand's Buddhist majority has been remarkably unified under the country's King. Considered above politics, the 81-year-old monarch rarely comments on political matters and instead stands as a suprasymbol of Thai cohesion. His picture graces most every restaurant and business in the land, and a giant billboard of his visage with the words "Long Live the King" greets visitors at Bangkok's airport. For years, millions of Thais wore yellow every Monday in a voluntary show of support for the King, who was born on the first day of the week...
...recent months, the Thai political landscape has seemingly shifted. While opposition Red Shirt politicians still publicly pledge loyalty to the monarch, their figurehead, former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, has openly alleged that one of the King's closest advisers was behind the 2006 army coup that unseated him. That adviser, General Prem Tinsulanonda, has dismissed the charge. Thaksin and his Red Shirt cohorts have been at pains to underline that they don't think the King himself had anything to do with the putsch that overthrew one of Thailand's most popular - but also most divisive - Prime Ministers...
...Thai Lunar New Year is usually a time when guns line the streets of Bangkok. Water guns, that is, manned by revelers who spray passersby to summon plenty of rain for the coming year's harvest. But today, as this Thai New Year began, the usual neon-hued water guns were supplanted by submachine guns held by soldiers who were trying to disperse the agitated antigovernment protesters who have blockaded part of central Bangkok for days...
...Earlier in the day, one Red Shirt leader, Jatuporn Prompan, had called on his fellow protesters to attack Abhisit in order to hasten the government's ouster. That evening, Thaksin - who is in self-imposed exile presumably because of a two-year conflict-of-interest jail sentence by a Thai court - added fuel to the fire by saying the time might be right for a "revolution." (Read a TIME Q&A with Thaksin...
...much energy Thais have for this permanent state of unrest is another question. Last year, the nation's all important tourist sector ground to a halt during the eight-day long protest at New Bangkok International Airport. A recent survey by the Suan Dusit polling agency shows that nearly 70% of Thais want Thaksin to stop inciting unrest and allow the government to work at solving the economic crisis. With the Thai economy set for a potential contraction of up to 4% this year, the Asian Development Bank said earlier this week that political infighting could hamper the effectiveness...