Their next meeting on Thai soil is probably still one royal succession, a few elections, court rulings and perhaps a new constitution away. On May 7th Ms Yingluck is poised to become the third prime minister to be removed from office by court order since Thailand’s revolution of 1932 (another unlucky nine, including her brother, were simply kicked out by coup d’état). On May 6th she appeared before the constitutional court to defend herself against allegations that she abused the powers of her office in 2011 by transferring a national-security adviser. The speculation has it that, if she were removed by a court order, it could trigger a civil war—which would be the first ever in a modern, upper-middle-income country. (For anyone planning to keep score: in 2011 Thailand’s upper-middle benchmark of $4,400 gross national income per capita put it in a higher bracket than Ukraine, with $3,100; the World Bank regards that as the difference between upper-middle and lower-middle income brackets.) - See more at: http://www.economist.com/blogs/banyan/2014/05/future-thailands-elite#sthash.SPjKAe0k.dpuf