Gen Prayut Chan-O-Cha’s first clear comments on Yingluck’s whereabouts came a month after she ghosted out off Thailand, ducking a court ruling over charges she failed to stop graft and losses in a costly rice subsidy policy by her government.
Yesterday (Sept 27) Thailand’s top court sentenced her in absentia to five years in jail, pulling the plug on her political career.
She maintained her innocence throughout the case, which she said was a political fit-up sculpted by her family’s enemies among the arch-royalist army and elite.
“I learned from the foreign ministry that now she is in Dubai,” said Gen Prayut, who toppled Yingluck’s government from office in a 2014 coup.
Once a fresh arrest warrant is issued, Thai authorities may proceed with extradition efforts, he told reporters.
Yingluck’s older brother Thaksin, also a former premier, has a home in Dubai.
Defence Minister Prawit Wongsuwan, a key architect of the coup that took down Yingluck’s government, said “It’s good she is in Dubai.
“Although we don’t have extradition treaty... Dubai officials informed our foreign ministry that they will not allow Yingluck to make any political move.”
The 50-year-old, who still has the right to appeal, has not appeared in public since pulling the vanishing act on August 25, her initial ruling date.