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BANGKOK: The King of Thailand, Maha Vajiralongkorn, restored official titles and military rank to his royal consort, according to a palace announcement on Wednesday, nearly a year after she was charged with disloyalty and disappeared from public view.
The announcement comes as Thailand is rocked by anti-government protests during which restrictions have also been demanded on the king’s recently expanded powers, breaking a strong taboo in a nation where conservative tradition holds the monarch as a semi-divine and above criticism. .
Sineenat Wongvajirapakdi, 35, had been stripped of the title of Royal Noble Consort last October in a palace statement calling her “ungrateful” for engaging in a rivalry with Queen Suthida, the monarch’s wife.
However, a statement published in the government’s Royal Gazette on Wednesday said that Sineenat “is not contaminated” and therefore is entitled to the title of noble royal consort and all of her previous positions within the palace.
“Therefore, the stripping of royal titles, the official position in the service of the crown in a military capacity and military ranks and the withdrawal of all declarations has never taken place,” the statement said. The order goes into effect on August 28.
Sineenat disappeared after his public dismissal and his whereabouts could not be confirmed.
This week, the Bild newspaper reported that he had arrived in Germany, where the Thai king spends much of the year.
King Vajiralongkorn was officially crowned constitutional monarch in May last year after taking the throne for the first time following the death of his father in 2016, who reigned for 70 years.
Days before his coronation, the king married the deputy chief of his personal bodyguard, 42-year-old Suthida Tidjai, giving him the title of Queen Suthida Bajrasudhabimalalakshana.
Just over two months later, he conferred the title of Royal Noble Consort on Sineenat, a former nurse and her bodyguard.
It was the first such appointment in nearly a century, long before the end of the absolute monarchy in 1932.
