A group headed by Thailand's top military official staged a coup Tuesday, sending the Thai baht to its lowest levels since 2002.

Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, who was in New York on Tuesday attending the meeting of the United Nations, declared a state of emergency and dismissed the head of the military, Gen. Sonthi Boonyaratglin.

Earlier, the Thai military declared martial law and took control of the prime minister's office as tanks circled the building.

Discontent among the Thai masses has increased steadily in the past few months as protestors demanded that Thaksin resign after he sold his stake in tech company Shin Corp. to Temasek Holdings of Singapore.

The military coup comes just weeks before the country's presidential election and follows a previous election in April, which was declared invalid by the courts.

The baht traded down 1.3% in afternoon trading, its largest one-day decline since 2002.

Shares of closed-end funds that focus on Thailand fell sharply in trading on Thursday. The Thai Fund (nyse: TTF - news - people ) managed by Morgan Stanley (nyse: MS - news - people ) declined 3.6% in afternoon trading, while the Thai Capital Fund (amex: TF - news - people ), managed by Daiwa, fell more than 5%.

Deyi Tan, a Morgan Stanley economist, said on Sept. 5 that Thailand's "political quagmire" since the April 2 elections is likely to affect private investment and stunt growth in the second half of the year.

News of the coup weighed on Wall Street, where the Dow Jones industrial average was down about 50 points in late trading.

More notably, Treasury bond yields slumped as investors sought the safe haven of the U.S. government bond market, a traditional refuge in times of global uncertainty. The ten-year Treasury yielded 4.71% in late trading, down from 4.81% late on Monday. Yields had been falling on weak economic data released early in the New York day, but they fell further when reports about the Thai situation circulated late in the morning.




SOURCE

State Of Emergency Report

Coup leaders declared Wednesday a national holiday and called top civil servants and foreign diplomats to a meeting at military headquarters to update the situations.

The coup leaders declared Wednesday "a holiday for government, banks and the stock exchange in order to quickly restore law and order," according to a statement read on national television.

They told top civil servants, leaders of state enterprises, and university presidents around Bangkok to meet at military headquarters at 9am "to learn about the new policy," the statement said.

An informed source said Gen Sonthi Bunyaratglin, coup leader, has ordered to invite foreign diplomats to attend the meeting to update them about the current situations in the country.

*Looks like nothings going to happen. Oh well... SOURCE

Talk about your civil unrest. They've apparently had 17 coups since the end of WWII. But it's one hell of a place to party!

As long as they don't fuck with the good food and cheap whores, the international community won't intervene. As they should not.

Just wondering if you know what religion the general who led the coup is?

its allways a bitch to come back from a business trip and find a ton of work for you to catch up on.

its REALLY a bitch to come home and find you've been ousted as the ruler of your country