Sineenat Wongvajirapakdi, the mistress of Thailand King Maha Vajiralongkorn, is again in news as part of an alleged scandal where her over 1,000 sexually explicit photographs, mostly nude, were anonymously leaked to anti-monarchy activists outside the country.
Though it has created a ripple now, the leak took place in November, as claimed by British journalist Andrew MacGregor Marshall who received the photos. Apart from him, the photos were sent to academic Pavin Chachavalpongpun who is living in Japan and faces criminal prosecution in Thailand for critiquing the monarchy.
Marshall in November took to Facebook and said, “Thailand’s royal family is facing another embarrassing scandal following the leak of hundreds of intimate photographs of King Vajiralongkorn’s official consort Sineenat ‘Koi’ Wongvajirapakdi amid savage infighting among competing palace factions. Three months ago, in August, a letter was sent to an address where I used to live and was forwarded to me. Inside was an SD card with 1,443 photographs that had apparently been extracted from three iPhones that Koi used to own.”
In the post, he added that the photos were sent to him shortly before Koi was released from Lat Yao women’s prison in Bangkok and returned to Munich to be with Vajiralongkorn on August 29, with all her royal titles and privileges back.
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Her return was opposed by supporters of Queen Suthida and Princess Bajrakitiyabha, he said, speculating that it is highly probable that the leak is an act of vengeance to sabotage her return to the King as her consort.
Such leaks have happened multiple times in the past as per the journalist, who in his post gave examples of similar incidents. “In 2007, a video was leaked showing Vajiralongkorn’s third wife Srirasmi semi-naked at her birthday party in 2001, and many naked photographs of Srirasmi have been leaked over the years,” he wrote.
“They show there is an ugly power struggle in the palace due to Vajiralongkorn’s chronically complicated sex life, and the royal civil war is likely to get progressively worse as Suthida and Koi compete for status and attention,” he said.
Suthida is the Queen consort of Thailand as the fourth wife of King Vajiralongkorn.