Thailand PM Resigns After Protests

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BANGKOK: Thailand's prime minister resigned on Tuesday after weeks of protests closed the capital's airports, stranding 300,000 travelers. Protesters promised to lift their siege, and international flights were expected to resume Friday.

The resignation of Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat came after the nation's Constitutional Court dissolved Thailand's top three ruling parties for electoral fraud and banned him from politics for five years.

Somchai, his administration paralyzed, has been forced to govern from the northern city of Chiang Mai since Wednesday. He accepted the ruling with equanimity.

"It is not a problem. I was not working for myself. Now I will be a full-time citizen," he told reporters in Chiang Mai.

Protest leaders said the airport seizures would end Wednesday.

With the waning of the political crisis, the official in charge of Thailand's airports said Suvarnabhumi international airport will resume operations on Friday.

"Please have confidence in us," said Vudhibhandhu Vichairatana, the chairman of the Airports of Thailand.

He called the flights a birthday gift for Thailand's revered King Bhumibol Adulyadej, who turns 81 on Dec. 5. The airport reopened to cargo flights Tuesday.

Officials had earlier said the airport would not reopen for commercial flights before Dec. 15, but Vudhibhandhu said he brought forward the date because an inspection revealed the airport had suffered no damage and could become operational more quickly.

After Tuesday's court decision, government spokesman Nattawut Sai-kau said the six-party governing coalition would step down.



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