"The eldest sister of Thailand's King Maha Vajiralongkorn has joined the race to be the country's next prime minister.
Princess Ubolratana Mahidol, 67, will stand for a party allied to ousted prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, according to registration papers.
Traditionally the Thai royal family stays out of politics, so this is an unprecedented move.
Thailand's election is scheduled to take place on 24 March.
The princess, who relinquished her royal title in the 1970s, has registered for the Thai Raksa Chart party."
Although the Princess relinquished her title she is still in general treated as a royal by the public and spoken of as a royal by the press so the few western reporters who's had time to report on the story speculates if she, in a country where its illegal to criticise the royal family, can be opposed by other candidates.
Even if she's legally not covered by the lèse-majesté legislation her candidacy is highly unlikely to be without the approval of her brother the King which means that she's basically untouchable and therefore in practice, according BBC reporter Jonathan Head, unopposable.
I'll bet my socks on that one day we'll look back on this as the moment when we saw the seeds for the fall of the Thai monarchy being planted.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia...t/thailand&link_location=live-reporting-story