PM Prayut Chan-o-cha visited Saudi Arabia earlier this week, and Thailand and Saudi mended relations they broke 33 years ago following the Blue Diamond Affair in 1989 where a Thai cleaner in Saudi’s royal palace stole diamonds worth US$20 million from the prince. The next year, three Saudi diplomats and a businessman trying to recover the gems were killed. According to the state-run Saudi Press Agency, Prayut gave “his sincere regrets for the tragic cases that took place in Thailand between 1989 to 1990.”
Back in 1989, the Saudi prince and his wife had been on holiday for three months when the cleaner started to hide the diamonds in places around the palace where he knew no one else would find them. Then, over a month, he slowly moved them into a cargo delivery that he eventually sent to Thailand. Before the palace could find out the cleaner had stolen the diamonds, he had…
