Thaksin to return from exile amid Thai post-election chaos

By Patpicha Tanakasempipat

FORMER Thai prime minister Thaksin

Shinawatra, who has lived in selfimposed exile for 15 years, is set to return to the Southeast Asian nation next month, a move likely to add to the political chaos that’s gripped the country since a May general election.

Thaksin, who turned 74 on Wednesday, will arrive in Bangkok on Aug. 10, his youngest daughter Paetongtarn Shinawatra, said in an Instagram post. She is among the three prime ministerial candidates of Thaksin-backed Pheu Thai Party, which is now leading the efforts of a pro-democracy coalition to form a new government and end a near decade-long military-backed rule.

It’s not the first time that Thaksin, a popular but polarizing politician, or his family has announced his plan to return to the country where he was ousted as the premier in a military coup in 2006. As recently as in May when the nation was in the middle of election campaign, he pledged to return before his birthday to raise his seven grandchildren. But this time it will be different,

Paetongtarn said, adding that preparations were underway to welcome him back. The Shinawatra family—an influential political dynasty—was happy and also concerned at the same time about Thaksin’s plan, she said.

The timing of Thaksin’s homecoming coincides with efforts by Pheu Thai to drum up support among pro-royalist political parties in the lower house and the nation’s conservative Senate, which holds the key to the country’s top political office under rules designed after a 2014 coup to entrench establishment influence in Thai politics.

T he eight-party democratic bloc has struggled to take power despite commanding a majority in the 500-member elected lower house. It’s short of the halfway mark in a joint sitting of the bicameral assembly whose current strength is 748.

The conservatives thwarted Pita Limjaroenrat, the coalition’s first prime minister candidate and leader of the progressive Move Forward Party, citing opposition to his reformist platforms that include amendments to the country’s harsh royal insult law.

The delay in government formation has weighed on Thailand’s stocks with foreign investors pulling out more than $3.5 billion this year. While the selling pressure has eased on prospects of a Pheu Thai-led government, many senators have ruled out support for a coalition that includes Pita’s party. and, again, shrapnel in the brain.

Pheu Thai has also held talks with conservative parties in recent days, fueling speculation that it may snap the alliance with Move Forward in exchange for support from conservatives to form a government.

Thaksin’s homecoming announcement signals that a deal between Pheu Thai and the conservative establishment is in the works, though doubts remain if the former leader will stick to his plan, said Peter Mumford, Southeast Asia practice head at consultancy Eurasia Group.

“As this is not the first time Thaksin has announced he will be returning to Thailand, the latest comments do not necessarily signal that a Pheu Thai-conservatives deal has been finalized already,” said Mumford.

Parties backed by Thaksin, with his large following among the rural voters, had won the most seats in every national vote between 2001 and 2019, only to be unseated from power by dissolutions or coups.

Shrapnel accounts for the majority of injuries treated at Mechnikov, doctors said. Bullet wounds, less so. Wounded soldiers are typically cared for in hospitals closer to the front line and then, once stabilized, they are brought to Mechnikov, a journey that can sometimes take half a day.

Dr. Simon Sechen brings in a soldier with a wide gash in his shin. A tourniquet was applied for roughly half a day, he explained, because the soldier was trapped in a faraway trench, and it took hours to evacuate him. Sechen had tried to encourage blood flow, but it may be too late. “We did all we could to fight for his leg,” he says.

The soldier is taken to the operating room, where Dr. Yakov Albayuk takes one look and determines that the leg must be amputated to save the soldier’s life. “After 12 hours without blood circulation, the limb will die,” Albayuk said, explaining that a tourniquet must be taken off after two hours and, if necessary, reapplied. “Because of tiny mistakes we’re losing people’s limbs.”

For Albayuk, every wound inspected on the operating table is a raw and unvarnished account of the brutality of the fight Ukrainian soldiers face in combat: constant bombardment, hidden mines, and cunning snipers.

In this soldier’s case, his wounds tell a story of bravery; he was advancing toward fire, not running away.

The amputation takes 20 minutes. Albayuk uses a surgical saw to cut through the bone. A nurse wraps up the severed limb, and it is taken away.

Nearby, a soldier lying on a stretcher in the hallway calls out for his girlfriend, Anna. He has been brought to Mechnikov so that doctors can treat complications from a leg that was amputated a few days ago at a hospital closer to the front line.

Anna rushes to his side and tells him to be strong. When he’s gone, she collapses into tears.

Later, a soldier named Maksym, who was injured while fighting in the Donetsk region, awakens in the intensive care unit to the sight of his wife, and then a relieved kiss from her. She traveled with his sister when they learned Maksym had been admitted for surgery.

“I am so happy I got to see them one more time,” Maksym said.

Like Ukraine itself, the Mechnikov Hospital—which is more than 200 years old—has been transformed by war over the past decade.

The hospital did not begin treating wounded soldiers until Russia’s invasion in 2014, when it was not prepared for the task, said Ryzhenko. Soldiers would be admitted with guts spilling out and massive amounts of blood loss. Back then, Ryzhenko saw cases he had only read about in textbooks. Today, Mechnikov is lauded for its state-of-the-art facilities and expertise—roughly 400 doctors spread across six buildings.

On Dr. Mykyta Lombrozov’s operating table is a soldier who sustained a shrapnel injury on the left part of the brain. The 28-year-old neurosurgeon’s elegant hands work methodically. Crushed skull pieces are removed, one by one, until he can extract the small metal fragments lodged in the soldier’s brain.

It’s a complicated surgery that would normally take up to four hours. The war has taught Lombrozov to finish it in 55 minutes. He does it every day, he says, sometimes up to eight times in a single 24-hour shift.

“It is very important to me, that’s why I am here. That’s why we all work here,” Lombrozov said as he looked down at the soldier. “He is our hero.”

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Thaksin has lived overseas since fleeing the country in 2008 to avoid corruption charges, shuttling between Hong Kong, Singapore, Dubai and London. Since leaving Thailand, he had been found guilty in absentia in several graft cases he said were politically motivated, and still faces a combined 10 years in prison in three cases if he returns.

Thaksin said in May that he would enter the legal process upon his return and that he didn’t want an amnesty from jail terms—something previously attempted by a government headed by his sister Yingluck Shinawatra in 2013 before it was toppled in the 2014 coup.

Paetongtarn, 36, may have a shot at being nominated for premiership once her party secures backing of enough lawmakers. Pheu Thai’s candidates also include property magnate Srettha Thavisin and former attorney-general Chaikasem Nitisiri.

The party has not announced which of the three will be nominated in the next round, after a vote this week was called off pending a petition by the Office of the Ombudsman to the Constitutional Court on the legality of parliament last week rejecting Pita’s re-nomination. Bloomberg News