Blue Diamond Affair Re-Revisited

Thailand belongs – beside Israel – to the few countries on earth that can afford to have no full diplomatic relations with Saudi Arabia. Most readers won’t be aware why Thailand ostracizes Saudi Arabia. Wait, it’s the other way round. Saudi Arabia is still waiting for justice. Prime Minister Abhisit wants to draw a line under the decades old case and normalize relations with the Saudis. After 19 years – finally? – an arrest warrant is issued. The whole saga began in 1989, in the Saudi capital Riyadh.

More precisely, in the palace of Prince Faisal, son of King Fahd. The palace employed a Thai house servant, Kriangkrai Taechamong, whose job included cleaning the room where the Prince and his family stored their jewels. Well, those jewels went missing and soon it turned out that they had been distributed among some influential people at the top of Thai society. At parties and receptions some of those missing jewels were seen in Thai cleavages. And many of these people would not stop at killing to protect themselves.

And yes, the Royal Thai Police is involved. It’s an ingeniously Thai story that so far ended with a trail of blood in the streets of Bangkok. Four Saudis were murdered, among them a diplomat, and to this day men remain marked. James Bond is slapstick in comparison. Agatha Christie couldn’t create the mystery surrounding that case herself. Just for the fun of it, with not much news to add, read the older refreshers below. There’s lots of material available online. Makes excellent reading to this day:

Wikipedia has an entry, the New York Times summed it up in 1994, the Independent with more background – and Jotman finally with a Timeline of the Blue Diamond Affair.

If Abhisit succeeds in laying the affair to rest, I’d say that would be a respectable triumph over internal reactionary forces.

If.




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August 6, 2009 | Filed Under News & Media, Politics, Society, The Thai Mind 

Comments

3 Responses to “Blue Diamond Affair Re-Revisited”

  1. BangkokDan on August 7th, 2009 1.41 am

    The Post has this update: Name Dropping in the Saudi Murder Case.

    BangkokDan

  2. number&number on August 7th, 2009 4.46 am

    Why couldn’t Agatha Christie figure out such a plot?

    I’m sure she would have done a splendid job if given the parameters.

  3. BangkokDan on August 7th, 2009 5.27 am

    Her books always conclude. The Thai plot will know no end, adding a dimension she wasn’t aware of.

    But then again, the case could have been concluded years ago.

    BangkokDan

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