1.
President of the United Nations General Assembly
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The President of the United Nations General Assembly is a position voted for by representatives in the United Nations General Assembly on a yearly basis. The President presides over the sessions of the General Assembly, Peter Thomson of Fiji has been elected as the United Nations General Assembly President of its 71st session beginning in September 2016. The election of Peter Thomson is a first for Fiji and the Pacific, the session of the assembly is scheduled for every year starting in September—any special, or emergency special, assemblies over the next year will be headed by the president of UNGA. The presidency rotates annually between the five groups, African, Asian, Eastern European, Latin American and Caribbean. In particular, it is customary that no permanent member of the United Nations Security Council ever serves as General Assembly president and this does not include special and emergency special sessions of the General Assembly. More news on UN elections and appointments
2.
Leslie Munro
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Sir Leslie Knox Munro KCMG KCVO was a New Zealand lawyer, journalist, and politician of international standing. Munro studied at Auckland Grammar School and the University of Auckland and he became dean of the law faculty at the University of Auckland in 1938, and taught and administrated at the university in a variety of roles until 1951. Munro was also president of the Auckland District Law Society from 1936 to 1938, Munro gave radio talks on world events for the New Zealand National Broadcasting Service, and wrote for the New Zealand Herald, where he was editor from 1942 to 1951. Munro was a member of the New Zealand National Party. In 1952 the new Prime Minister, Sidney Holland, appointed Munro the New Zealand ambassador to the United States, and the permanent representative of New Zealand to the United Nations. As New Zealands permanent representative to the UN, he served as president of the Trusteeship Council from 1953 to 1954 and he was also three times President of the Security Council, and was serving in that position at the outbreak of Suez Crisis in 1956. At the UN he was a critic of the Soviet response to the 1956 Hungarian Revolution. Munro was knighted in 1955 with a KCMG, followed by a KCVO in 1957 and he wrote the widely read United Nations, Hope for a divided world in 1960. For the academic year 1960–1961, he was a Fellow on the faculty in the Center for Advanced Study at Wesleyan University, Middletown, at the end of Munros appointment to Washington he had been replaced by a career diplomat. After the 1960 New Zealand election Munro expected the new National government to either reappoint him to Washington or to him the post of High Commissioner to London. His personal traits had however made him unpopular amongst the senior officials of the Prime Ministers Department, a recommendation was made to the new Prime Minister Keith Holyoake that Monro not be reappointed to an overseas diplomatic position. Munro returned to New Zealand and was elected as a National Party Member of Parliament, first for Waipa in 1963, Munro had proposed to stand for Tamaki in 1960 but only if he was unopposed for the party selection. Muldoon wanted to enter parliament so went for selection despite the request of the National Party president Alex McKenzie to stand aside, Muldoon won the selection, and won the seat from Bob Tizard. However, personal and professional antagonisms with two Prime Ministers Keith Holyoake then John Marshall prevented him from attaining high rank in those administrations, Holyoake usually kept him from speaking in caucus until the end of the debate, when the conclusion had been decided. Munro was married twice, and had a daughter from each marriage and his first marriage, to Christine Priestley, lasted for two years, as it was cut short by her death in 1929 three days after the birth of their daughter. Munros second marriage, to Muriel Sturt in 1931, was to last until his death in Hamilton in 1974, New Zealand and the Vietnam War, Politics and Diplomacy. Auckland, New Zealand, Auckland University Press, all Honourable Men, Inside the Muldoon Cabinet, 1975-1984. A film clip Longines Chronoscope with Knox Leslie Munro is available at the Internet Archive
3.
Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Thailand)
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The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is the principal governmental department in charge of foreign relations in Thailand. The ministry is headed by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, who is also a member of the Cabinet of Thailand and he is appointed by the prime minister. The ministry is charged with formulating and executing foreign policies for the Kingdom of Thailand, the ministry manages and maintains Thai diplomatic missions around the globe. Kromma Tha and Phra Khlang redirect here Prior to the creation of the ministry, during the Kingdom of Ayutthaya foreign relations were handled by the Krom Phra Khlang. The head of the department was known as Phra Khlang and occasionally referred to as Berguelang or Barcelon by foreign authors, the famous 17th-century Siamese ambassador to France Kosa Pan was the younger brother of King Narais Phra Khlang Kosathibodi. Soon after, a sub-department called Kromma Tha was created to deal with foreigners, during the Bangkok Period most of these features were retained. In 1840, King Mongkut, the king, founded the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Kingdom of Siam. The responsibilities and roles of the old Krom were shifted to this ministry, chao Phraya Bhanuwong became the first Foreign Minister of Siam in 1871, appointed by King Chulalongkorn. In 1881 Prince Devavongse Varoprakarn was appointed to replace him, known today as the father of Thai diplomacy he reorganized and modernized the ministry to meet 19th century standards. The ministry was then established at Saranrom Palace, east of the Grand Palace. Gustave Rolin-Jaequemyns, a legal scholar, served as Adviser-General from 1892 to 1902. Edward Strobel, a Harvard Law School Bemis Professor of International Law and he was followed by Harvard Law Professors Jens Westengard, Francis B. After the Revolution of 1932, the ministry came under civilian control, the first minister under this new system was Phraya Sri Visarn Vacha. See more at, Foreign relations of Thailand Most of the offices of the ministry were moved to a new building complex, Sri Ayutthaya Building,443 Sri Ayutthaya Rd. Ratchathewi. This building is on the premises of the Office of the South East Asia Treaty Organization
4.
Thanat Khoman
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Thanat Khoman was a Thai diplomat and politician. He was foreign minister from 1959 to 1971, chairman of the Democrat Party from 1979 to 1982 and he died at the age of 101 on 3 March 2016, a couple of months just shy of his 102nd birthday. Thanat was born in Bangkok and came from a Thai Chinese family and his father, Phraya Phiphaksa Satayathipatai was one of Siams first law school graduates and a judge who on the Supreme Court of Thailand. Thanat attended Assumption College in Bangkok, before he went to France, after his return to Thailand, Thanat was obliged to join the diplomatic service, as the foreign ministry had financed his studies. During World War II he was stationed as a secretary at the Thai embassy in Tokyo from 1941 to 1943. In February 1945, he was a member of a delegation to the Allied South East Asia Command in Kandy. After the Second World War, he held a number of posts, including chargé daffaires at the Thai embassies in Washington, D. C. In 1950 he was chosen as the chairman of the UN Economic Commission for Asia, from 1952 to 1957 he served as the deputy to the Permanent Representative from Thailand to the United Nations. In 1957 he was promoted to the post of the Ambassador of Thailand to the United States, on 10 February 1959 he was appointed Minister of Foreign Affairs of Thailand in the government of authoritarian Prime Minister Sarit Thanarat. His major contribution was in promoting regional reconciliation and cooperation in Southeast Asia and he was a participant in SEATO talks in 1961. In March 1962 he signed a joint communiqué with U. S. State Secretary Dean Rusk in which the U. S. promised Thailand support and defense against potential Communist aggression. Despite being only a protocol, it was celebrated in Thailand as a bilateral pact of the two countries, dubbed the Rusk-Thanat Agreement. In the 1960s Thanat played a key role in mediating between Indonesia and Malaysia, the choice of Bangkok as the founding place of ASEAN on 8 August 1967 was an expression of respect for his active role in the formation of this institution. On 17 November 1971 he resigned his post after a coup détat, after his resignation as foreign minister, Thanat entered national politics in 1979 and served as chairman of the Democrat Party until 1982. Between 1980 and 1982 he was deputy prime minister in the government of Prem Tinsulanonda. In 1982 he retired from political life and he celebrated his 100th birthday in 2014. His wife, Molee, is a granddaughter of Tan Kim Ching. Malaya, Honorary Grand Commander of the Order of the Defender of the Realm
5.
Plaek Phibunsongkhram
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He was born Plaek Khittasangkha in Nonthaburi Province to Keed Khittasangkha and his wife. Keed was of Chinese-Thai heritage, his father was a Cantonese-speaking Chinese immigrant, plaeks parents owned a durian orchard. He received his given name - meaning strange in Thai - because of his appearance as a child. Plaek Khittasangkha studied at Buddhist temple schools, then was appointed to Chulachomklao Royal Military Academy and he graduated in 1914 and was commissioned a second lieutenant in the artillery. Following World War I, he was sent to study tactics in France. In 1928, as he rose in rank, he received the title of Luang from King Prajadhipok. He would later drop his title, but adopted Phibunsongkhram as his surname, Phibunsongkhram was one of the leaders of the military branch of the Peoples Party that staged a coup détat and overthrew the absolute monarchy in 1932. Then-Lieutenant Colonel Phibunsongkhram rose to prominence as a man-on-horseback, the following year, Phibunsongkhram, along with officers allied in the same cause, successfully crushed the Boworadet Rebellion. This was a royalist revolt led by Prince Boworadet, while King Prajadhipok was not in any way involved in the rebellion, it marked the beginning of a slide which ended in his 1935 abdication and replacement by King Ananda Mahidol. The new King was still a child studying in Switzerland, and parliament appointed Colonel Prince Anuwatjaturong, Lieutenant Commander Prince Athitaya Dibhabha, Phibunsongkhram began to increase the pace of modernisation in Thailand. Together with Luang Wichitwathakan, the Minister of Propaganda, he built a cult in 1938. Photographs of Phibunsongkhram were to be everywhere, and those of the abdicated King Prajadhipok were banned. His quotes appeared in newspapers, were plastered on billboards and were repeated over the radio, aimed to uplift the national spirit and moral code of the nation and instilling progressive tendencies and a newness into Thai life, a series of Cultural Mandates were issued by the government. These mandates encouraged that all Thais were to salute the flag in public places, know the new national anthem, people were encouraged to adopt Western, as opposed to traditional, attire. Similarly, people were encouraged to eat with a fork and spoon, anti-Chinese policies were imposed, and the Thai people were to purchase as many Thai products as possible and therefore destroy the Chinese proportion in markets. In 1939, Phibunsongkhram changed the name from Siam to Thailand. In 1941, in the midst of World War II, he decreed 1 January as the start of the new year instead of the traditional 13 April. While ardently pro-Japanese at the beginning, Phibunsongkhram and his administration soon distanced themselves from Japan following the aftermath of the French-Thai War and this conflict lasted from October 1940 to May 1941
6.
Bangkok
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Bangkok is the capital and most populous city of Thailand. It is known in Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon or simply Krung Thep. The city occupies 1,568.7 square kilometres in the Chao Phraya River delta in Central Thailand, over 14 million people live within the surrounding Bangkok Metropolitan Region, making Bangkok an extreme primate city, significantly dwarfing Thailands other urban centres in terms of importance. Bangkok was at the heart of the modernization of Siam—later renamed Thailand—during the late 19th century, the city grew rapidly during the 1960s through the 1980s and now exerts a significant impact on Thailands politics, economy, education, media and modern society. The Asian investment boom in the 1980s and 1990s led many multinational corporations to locate their headquarters in Bangkok. The city is now a regional force in finance and business. It is a hub for transport and health care, and has emerged as a regional centre for the arts, fashion. The city is known for its vibrant street life and cultural landmarks. The historic Grand Palace and Buddhist temples including Wat Arun and Wat Pho stand in contrast with other tourist attractions such as the scenes of Khaosan Road. Bangkok is among the top tourist destinations. It is named the most visited city in MasterCards Global Destination Cities Index, Bangkoks rapid growth amidst little urban planning and regulation has resulted in a haphazard cityscape and inadequate infrastructure systems. The city has turned to public transport in an attempt to solve this major problem. Five rapid transit lines are now in operation, with more systems under construction or planned by the national government and the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration. The history of Bangkok dates at least back to the early 15th century, because of its strategic location near the mouth of the river, the town gradually increased in importance. Bangkok initially served as a customs outpost with forts on both sides of the river, and became the site of a siege in 1688 in which the French were expelled from Siam. After the fall of Ayutthaya to the Burmese Empire in 1767, the newly declared King Taksin established his capital at the town, in 1782, King Phutthayotfa Chulalok succeeded Taksin, moved the capital to the eastern banks Rattanakosin Island, thus founding the Rattanakosin Kingdom. The City Pillar was erected on 21 April, which is regarded as the date of foundation of the present city, Bangkoks economy gradually expanded through busy international trade, first with China, then with Western merchants returning in the early-to-mid 19th century. As the capital, Bangkok was the centre of Siams modernization as it faced pressure from Western powers in the late 19th century, Bangkok became the centre stage for power struggles between the military and political elite as the country abolished absolute monarchy in 1932
7.
Thailand
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Thailand, officially the Kingdom of Thailand, formerly known as Siam, is a country at the centre of the Indochinese peninsula in Southeast Asia. With a total area of approximately 513,000 km2, Thailand is the worlds 51st-largest country and it is the 20th-most-populous country in the world, with around 66 million people. The capital and largest city is Bangkok, Thailand is a constitutional monarchy and has switched between parliamentary democracy and military junta for decades, the latest coup being in May 2014 by the National Council for Peace and Order. Its capital and most populous city is Bangkok and its maritime boundaries include Vietnam in the Gulf of Thailand to the southeast, and Indonesia and India on the Andaman Sea to the southwest. The Thai economy is the worlds 20th largest by GDP at PPP and it became a newly industrialised country and a major exporter in the 1990s. Manufacturing, agriculture, and tourism are leading sectors of the economy and it is considered a middle power in the region and around the world. The country has always been called Mueang Thai by its citizens, by outsiders prior to 1949, it was usually known by the exonym Siam. The word Siam has been identified with the Sanskrit Śyāma, the names Shan and A-hom seem to be variants of the same word. The word Śyâma is possibly not its origin, but a learned, another theory is the name derives from Chinese, Ayutthaya emerged as a dominant centre in the late fourteenth century. The Chinese called this region Xian, which the Portuguese converted into Siam, the signature of King Mongkut reads SPPM Mongkut King of the Siamese, giving the name Siam official status until 24 June 1939 when it was changed to Thailand. Thailand was renamed Siam from 1945 to 11 May 1949, after which it reverted to Thailand. According to George Cœdès, the word Thai means free man in the Thai language, ratcha Anachak Thai means kingdom of Thailand or kingdom of Thai. Etymologically, its components are, ratcha, -ana- -chak, the Thai National Anthem, written by Luang Saranupraphan during the extremely patriotic 1930s, refers to the Thai nation as, prathet Thai. The first line of the anthem is, prathet thai ruam lueat nuea chat chuea thai, Thailand is the unity of Thai flesh. There is evidence of habitation in Thailand that has been dated at 40,000 years before the present. Similar to other regions in Southeast Asia, Thailand was heavily influenced by the culture and religions of India, Thailand in its earliest days was under the rule of the Khmer Empire, which had strong Hindu roots, and the influence among Thais remains even today. Voretzsch believes that Buddhism must have been flowing into Siam from India in the time of the Indian Emperor Ashoka of the Maurya Empire, later Thailand was influenced by the south Indian Pallava dynasty and north Indian Gupta Empire. The Menam Basin was originally populated by the Mons, and the location of Dvaravati in the 7th century, the History of the Yuan mentions an embassy from the kingdom of Sukhothai in 1282
8.
Dynasty
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A dynasty is a sequence of rulers from the same family, usually in the context of a feudal or monarchical system but sometimes also appearing in elective republics. The dynastic family or lineage may be known as a house, historians periodize the histories of many sovereign states, such as Ancient Egypt, the Carolingian Empire and Imperial China, using a framework of successive dynasties. As such, the dynasty may be used to delimit the era during which the family reigned and to describe events, trends. The word dynasty itself is often dropped from such adjectival references, until the 19th century, it was taken for granted that a legitimate function of a monarch was to aggrandize his dynasty, that is, to increase the territory, wealth, and power of his family members. The longest-surviving dynasty in the world is the Imperial House of Japan, dynasties throughout the world have traditionally been reckoned patrilineally, such as under the Frankish Salic law. Succession through a daughter when permitted was considered to establish a new dynasty in her husbands ruling house, however, some states in Africa, determined descent matrilineally, while rulers have at other times adopted the name of their mothers dynasty when coming into her inheritance. It is also extended to unrelated people such as poets of the same school or various rosters of a single sports team. The word dynasty derives via Latin dynastia from Greek dynastéia, where it referred to power, dominion and it was the abstract noun of dynástēs, the agent noun of dynamis, power or ability, from dýnamai, to be able. A ruler in a dynasty is referred to as a dynast. For example, following his abdication, Edward VIII of the United Kingdom ceased to be a member of the House of Windsor. A dynastic marriage is one that complies with monarchical house law restrictions, the marriage of Willem-Alexander, Prince of Orange, to Máxima Zorreguieta in 2002 was dynastic, for example, and their eldest child is expected to inherit the Dutch crown eventually. But the marriage of his younger brother Prince Friso to Mabel Wisse Smit in 2003 lacked government support, thus Friso forfeited his place in the order of succession, lost his title as a Prince of the Netherlands, and left his children without dynastic rights. In historical and monarchist references to formerly reigning families, a dynast is a member who would have had succession rights, were the monarchys rules still in force. Even since abolition of the Austrian monarchy, Max and his descendants have not been considered the rightful pretenders by Austrian monarchists, nor have they claimed that position. The term dynast is sometimes used only to refer to descendants of a realms monarchs. The term can therefore describe overlapping but distinct sets of people, yet he is not a male-line member of the royal family, and is therefore not a dynast of the House of Windsor. Thus, in 1999 he requested and obtained permission from Elizabeth II to marry the Roman Catholic Princess Caroline of Monaco. Yet a clause of the English Act of Settlement 1701 remained in effect at that time and that exclusion, too, ceased to apply on 26 March 2015, with retroactive effect for those who had been dynasts prior to triggering it by marriage to a Catholic
9.
Chakri dynasty
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The Chakri dynasty is the current ruling royal house of the Kingdom of Thailand, while the Head of the house is the monarch. The royal house was founded by King Rama I, an Ayutthayan military leader of Sino-Mon descent, prior to the founding of the dynasty, King Rama I held for years the title Chakri, the title of the civil chancellor. In founding the dynasty, King Rama I himself chose Chakri as the name for the dynasty, the emblem of the dynasty is composed of the discus and the trident, the celestial weapons of god Vishnu and Shiva, whom the Thai sovereign is seen as an incarnation. The houses current dynastic seat is the Grand Palace in Bangkok, the present royal family of Thailand is descended from Prince Mahidol Adulyadej of Songkla and Srinagarindra forming the House of Mahidol. The Prince was a son of King Chulalongkorn and his wife Queen Savang Vadhana, the Prince was also the half-brother of both King Vajiravudh and King Prajadhipok. After the death of King Ananda Mahidol, King Bhumibol Adulyadej ascended the throne in 1946, in 1949 the King married his first cousin once removed, Mom Rajawongse Sirikit Kitiyakara. Bhumibol was succeeded by his son Maha Vajiralongkorn officially on 13 October 2016, but was proclaimed King on 1 December 2016
10.
Royal Thai Army
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The Royal Thai Army or RTA is the army of Thailand responsible for protecting its sovereignty. It is the oldest and largest branch of the Royal Thai Armed Forces, the Royal Thai Army is responsible for protecting the kingdoms sovereignty. It is the oldest and largest branch of the Royal Thai Armed Forces, the army was formed in 1874, partly as a response to new security threats following the 1855 Bowring Treaty with Britain, which opened the country for international trade. The general retired October 2014 to concentrate on political reform which he said would take at least a year, observers have noted a power struggle in 2016 between the factions of the Thai army and their support of different heirs. On 24 December 2015 the RTA broke ground for a new auditorium, the 2.3 billion baht facility will replace an existing 58 year-old auditorium. The building is due to be completed in 2019, the ground floor auditorium will accommodate 500 people, an office, a press room, and a reception hall. The first floor include a party room for 500 people. The second floor will hold a second auditorium for 3,000 people, the basement car park is designed to accommodate 400 vehicles. The Royal Thai Army is commanded by the Commander of the Royal Thai Army, the current commander is General Chalermchai Sitthisart, who was confirmed by royal appointment to take over the top post in 2016. The Royal Thai Army headquarters is on Ratchadamnoen Nok Road in Bangkok, the Royal Thai Army today is divided into four army areas, First Army – headquartered in Bangkok and is responsible for the countrys western and central provinces including the capital city. 3rd and 6th Infantry Divisions 3rd Cavalry Division 2nd Development Division Third Army – headquartered in Phitsanulok, 4th and 7th Infantry Divisions 1st Cavalry Division 3rd Development Division. Fourth Army – headquartered in Nakhon Si Thammarat, responsible for southern Thailand, 5th Infantry Division – 15th Infantry Division – – operating Bell UH-1Hs and Sikorsky S-70-43 Black Hawks with six more on order. Gong Bin Sanub-sanoon Tua Pai – operating Boeing CH-47D Chinooks, Bell UH-1Hs, and Mil Mi-17V5s The army aviation centre is based here, types operated are Cessna T-41Bs, Maule MX-7s, and Schweizer S-300C piston trainer helicopters. The two former VIP Beechcraft 200 King Air aeroplanes, are based here. These aeroplanes were modified in the US in the late-1990s, a separate airfield within the Lopburi complex houses the 5th Aircraft Maintenance Company. This unit is responsible for maintenance and storage of army aircraft, the 5th Infantry Division operates the following aviation assets from a small airfield within the army reserve at Nakhon Si Thammarat, two Bell 206B-3s, three Schweizer TH-300Cs and two Maule MX-7s. A detachment of helicopters can be found here from the Air Mobility Companies based at Lopburi, the 6th Infantry Battalion is based near Ubon Ratchatani. The Royal Thai Army is known to operate the aircraft types
11.
King's Guard (Thailand)
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The Kings Guard is a ceremonial designation given to various regiments within the Royal Thai Armed Forces. This contingent is dedicated to the protection of the Royal Family of Thailand, the Royal Guards were established by King Chulalongkorn the Great of Thailand in 1859, when he was still crown prince. Initially, the Royal Guards were servants with duties such as scaring crows, when he succeeded his father in 1868, King Chulalongkorn took his Royal Guard and formed a 24-strong Royal Bodyguard, referred to as the Thahan Song Lo. In 1870, the Royal Guard regiment were given the name the Kings Guard and these officers were formed into a special company called Military Engineers of the Royal Bodyguard, in which Mr. James McCarthy held the rank of captain. The Royal Guards still exist down to the present and serve as protectors of the Royal Family of Thailand, todays Kings Guard units serve as the Thai equivalent to the guards units of various countries
12.
Military ranks of the Thai armed forces
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The Royal Thai Army is the land-based part of the Thai military. Private 1st class is a rank assigned to conscripts after they have finished specialist training and they wear the same insignia as a lance corporal, who is a member who has completed his conscription obligation, and who has undertaken training at NCO school. The Royal Thai Navy is the part of the Thai military. The Royal Thai Marine Corps is part of the RTN, depending on the uniform, the rank insignia can be located on the shoulder or on the sleeves. Naval officers will add the post-nominal ร. น. as an abbreviation for ราชนาวี. The Royal Thai Air Force is the air based part of the Thai military, the Royal Thai Police is sometimes considered as the fourth armed force of Thailand. The Royal Thai Police uses the rank systems as the Royal Thai Army but the particularities of the police are the star representing the commissioned officer. The Royal Thai Police uses the silver star and the silver crown with a halo on top. The Royal Thai Army uses the gold star and the gold crown with no halo. Chom is Chief of Forces Ranks below commander-in-chief use Thai alternate numbers, Thai royal and noble titles Royal Thai Army Royal Thai Air force Royal Thai Navy Thai Ministry of Defence Royal Thai Police
13.
United Nations General Assembly
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The United Nations General Assembly is one of the six principal organs of the United Nations and the only one in which all member nations have equal representation. The General Assembly is the deliberative, policymaking and representative organ of the UN. It has also established a number of subsidiary organs. It can also reconvene for special and emergency special sessions and its composition, functions, powers, voting, and procedures are set out in Chapter IV of the United Nations Charter. The first session was convened on 10 January 1946 in the Methodist Central Hall in London, other questions are decided by a straightforward majority. Each member country has one vote, apart from approval of budgetary matters, including adoption of a scale of assessment, Assembly resolutions are not binding on the members. The Assembly may make recommendations on any matters within the scope of the UN, except matters of peace, the one state, one vote power structure potentially allows states comprising just five percent of the world population to pass a resolution by a two-thirds vote. During the 1980s, the Assembly became a forum for the North-South dialogue and these issues came to the fore because of the phenomenal growth and changing makeup of the UN membership. In 1945, the UN had 51 members and it now has 193, of which more than two-thirds are developing countries. Because of their numbers, developing countries are able to determine the agenda of the Assembly, the character of its debates. For many developing countries, the UN is the source of much of their diplomatic influence, the Assembly can consider the matter immediately with a view to making recommendations to Members for collective measures to maintain or restore international peace and security. The first session of the UN General Assembly was convened on 10 January 1946 in the Methodist Central Hall in London, the next few annual sessions were held in different cities, the second session in New York, and the third session was in Paris. It moved to the permanent United Nations Headquarters in New York at the start of its seventh regular annual session, on 14 October 1952. In December 1988, in order to hear Yasser Arafat, the General Assembly organised its 29th session in the Palace of Nations, all 193 members states of the United Nations are members of the General Assembly. The agenda for each session is planned up to seven months in advance and this is refined into a provisional agenda 60 days before the opening of the session. Items on the agenda are numbered, the General Assembly votes on many resolutions brought forth by sponsoring states. These are generally statements symbolizing the sense of the community about an array of world issues. Most General Assembly resolutions are not enforceable as a legal or practical matter, the General Assembly has authority to make final decisions in some areas such as the United Nations budget
14.
Mongkut
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During his reign, the pressure of Western expansionism was felt for the first time in Siam. Mongkut embraced Western innovations and initiated the modernization of his country, Mongkut was also known for his appointing his brother, Prince Chutamani, as Second King, crowned in 1851 as King Pinklao. Mongkut himself assured the country that Pinklao should be respected with equal honor to himself, Mongkuts reign was also the time when the power of the House of Bunnag reached its zenith and became the most powerful noble family of Siam. Mongkut was the son of Prince Isarasundhorn, son of Phutthayotfa Chulalok. Mongkut was born in the Old Palace in 1804, where the first son had died shortly after birth in 1801 and he was followed by Prince Chutamani in 1808. In 1809, Prince Isarasundhorn was crowned as Buddha Loetla Nabhalai The royal family moved to the Grand Palace. Thenceforth until their own accessions as kings, the brothers were called Chao Fa Yai, in 1824, Mongkut became a Buddhist monk, following a Siamese tradition that men aged 20 should become monks for a time. The same year, his father died, by tradition, Mongkut should have been crowned the next king, but the nobility instead chose the influential Prince Jessadabodindra, son of a royal concubine rather than a queen. Perceiving the throne was irredeemable and to political intrigues, Mongkut retained his monastic status. Vajirayan became one of the members of the family who devoted their life to religion. He travelled around the country as a monk and saw the relaxation of the rules of Pali Canon among the Siamese monks he met, in 1829, at Phetchaburi, he met a monk named Buddhawangso, who strictly followed the canon. Vajirayan admired Buddhawangso for his obedience to the canon, and was inspired to pursue religious reforms, in 1833, he began a reform movement reinforcing the canon law that evolved into the Dhammayuttika Nikaya, or Thammayut sect. In 1836, Vajirayan arrived at Wat Bowonniwet in what is now Bangkoks central district, but was then the city proper, during this time, he discovered Western knowledge, studying Latin, English, and astronomy with missionaries and sailors. Vicar Pallegoix of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Bangkok lived nearby, Vajirayan admired Christian morals and achievements as presented by the vicar, but could make nothing of Christian doctrine. It was then he made the comment later attributed to him as king, What you teach people to do is admirable, but what you teach them to believe is foolish. King Mongkut would later be noted for his excellent command of English, although it is said that his brother, Vice-King Pinklao. Chulalongkorn also persuaded his fathers 47th child, Vajirañana, to enter the order, accounts vary about Nangklaos intentions regarding the succession. It is recorded that Nangklao verbally dismissed the royal princes from succession for various reasons, Prince Mongkut was dismissed for encouraging monks to dress in the Mon style
15.
University of Oxford
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The University of Oxford is a collegiate research university located in Oxford, England. It grew rapidly from 1167 when Henry II banned English students from attending the University of Paris, after disputes between students and Oxford townsfolk in 1209, some academics fled north-east to Cambridge where they established what became the University of Cambridge. The two ancient universities are frequently referred to as Oxbridge. The university is made up of a variety of institutions, including 38 constituent colleges, All the colleges are self-governing institutions within the university, each controlling its own membership and with its own internal structure and activities. Being a city university, it not have a main campus, instead, its buildings. Oxford is the home of the Rhodes Scholarship, one of the worlds oldest and most prestigious scholarships, the university operates the worlds oldest university museum, as well as the largest university press in the world and the largest academic library system in Britain. Oxford has educated many notable alumni, including 28 Nobel laureates,27 Prime Ministers of the United Kingdom, the University of Oxford has no known foundation date. Teaching at Oxford existed in form as early as 1096. It grew quickly in 1167 when English students returned from the University of Paris, the historian Gerald of Wales lectured to such scholars in 1188 and the first known foreign scholar, Emo of Friesland, arrived in 1190. The head of the university had the title of chancellor from at least 1201, the university was granted a royal charter in 1248 during the reign of King Henry III. After disputes between students and Oxford townsfolk in 1209, some academics fled from the violence to Cambridge, the students associated together on the basis of geographical origins, into two nations, representing the North and the South. In later centuries, geographical origins continued to many students affiliations when membership of a college or hall became customary in Oxford. At about the time, private benefactors established colleges as self-contained scholarly communities. Among the earliest such founders were William of Durham, who in 1249 endowed University College, thereafter, an increasing number of students lived in colleges rather than in halls and religious houses. In 1333–34, an attempt by some dissatisfied Oxford scholars to found a new university at Stamford, Lincolnshire was blocked by the universities of Oxford and Cambridge petitioning King Edward III. Thereafter, until the 1820s, no new universities were allowed to be founded in England, even in London, thus, Oxford and Cambridge had a duopoly, the new learning of the Renaissance greatly influenced Oxford from the late 15th century onwards. Among university scholars of the period were William Grocyn, who contributed to the revival of Greek language studies, and John Colet, the noted biblical scholar. With the English Reformation and the breaking of communion with the Roman Catholic Church, recusant scholars from Oxford fled to continental Europe, as a centre of learning and scholarship, Oxfords reputation declined in the Age of Enlightenment, enrolments fell and teaching was neglected
16.
Balliol College, Oxford
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Balliol College /ˈbeɪliəl/, founded in 1263, is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. Among the colleges alumni are three former ministers, five Nobel laureates, and numerous literary and philosophical figures, including Adam Smith, Gerard Manley Hopkins. In 2012 Balliol had an endowment of £62. 5m, Balliol College was founded in about 1263 by John I de Balliol under the guidance of the Bishop of Durham. Under a statute of 1881, New Inn Hall was merged into Balliol College in 1887, Balliol acquired New Inn Halls admissions and other records for 1831–1887 as well as the library of New Inn Hall, which largely contained 18th-century law books. Along with many of the ancient colleges, Balliol has evolved its own traditions and customs over the centuries, the patron saint of the College is Saint Catherine of Alexandria. On her feast day, a dinner is held for all final year students within Balliol. This festival was established by 1550. Another important feast is the Snell Dinner and this dinner is held in memory of John Snell, whose benefaction established exhibitions for students from the University of Glasgow to study at Balliol one of whom was Adam Smith. The feast is attended by fellows of Balliol College, the current Snell Exhibitioners, by far the most eccentric event is The Nepotists carol-singing event organised by the Colleges Arnold and Brackenbury Society. This event happens on the last Friday of Michaelmas term each year, on this occasion, Balliol students congregate in the college hall to enjoy mulled wine and the singing of carols. The evening historically ended with a rendition of The Gordouli on Broad Street, outside the gates of Trinity College, verses of this form are now known as Balliol rhymes. The best known of these rhymes is the one on Benjamin Jowett and this has been widely quoted and reprinted in virtually every book about Jowett and about Balliol ever since. This and 18 others are attributed to Henry Charles Beeching, the other quatrains are much less well known. For many years, there has been a traditional and fierce rivalry shown between the students of Balliol and those of its neighbour to the east, Trinity College. It has manifested itself on the field and the river, in the form of songs sung over the dividing walls. The rivalry reflects that which exists between Trinity College, Cambridge and Balliols sister college, St Johns College, Cambridge. In college folklore, the rivalry back to the late 17th century. In fact, in its form, the rivalry appears to date from the late 1890s
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Sciences Po
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Sciences Po, or Paris Institute of Political Studies is a selective university located in Paris, France, and is widely considered to be one of the most prestigious in France. Sciences Po is a university focused on the social sciences and its main campus encircles Boulevard Saint Germain in the 7th arrondissement. Undergraduate students can choose to study in one of its six campuses in Reims, Dijon, Le Havre, Nancy, Poitiers or Menton, each focusing on a different cultural. The institution is a member of several academic consortia, Sciences Po was created in 1872 to improve the training of public servants and politicians in the aftermath of the French defeat in the Franco-Prussian war of 1871. Many notable public figures are among its alumni, including most French presidents and it has also been strongly criticized for creating an oligarchy in French society and being at the centre of several scandals. Following defeat in the 1870 war, the demise of Napoleon III, and the Paris Commune, politically and economically, people feared Frances international stature was waning due to inadequate teaching of its political and diplomatic corps. ELSP was meant to serve as breeding ground where nearly all the major, non-technical state commissioners were trained. ”New disciplines such as International Relations, International Law, Political Economy. In August 1894, the British Association for the Advancement of Science spoke out for the need to advance the study of politics along the lines of ELSP. Sidney and Beatrice Webb used the purpose and curriculum of Sciences Po as part of their inspiration for creating the London School of Economics in 1895. As per ordinance 45-2284 issued on 9 October 1945, two entities were created from ELSP, Fondation nationale des sciences politiques or FNSP, and Institut détudes politiques de Paris or IEP Paris. Both entities were tasked by the French government to ensure “the progress, the epithet Sciences Po was applied to both entities, which inherited the reputation previously vested in ELSP. Frances Legislature entrusted FNSP with managing IEP Paris, its library, and budget, and they are not to be confounded with Sciences Pos satellite campuses. FNSP further strengthened its role as a publication center with significant donations from the Rockefeller Foundation. Sciences Po underwent various reforms under the directorship of Richard Descoings, in these years, Sciences Po introduced a compulsory year abroad component to its undergraduate degree, and began to offer a multilingual curriculum in French, English, and other languages. It was during this period that Sciences Po added its regional campuses, Sciences Po also implemented reforms in its admissions process. Previously, Sciences Po recruited its students exclusively on the basis of a competitive examination and this system was seen to favor students from prestigious preparatory high schools or those who could afford year-long preparatory courses. In March 2001, the governing council widened its admissions policy. Sciences Po is located in Paris, in the 6th and 7th districts,27 rue Saint-Guillaume houses the office since 1879
18.
Vajiravudh
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King Vajiravudh is known for his efforts to create and promote Siamese nationalism. His reign was characterized by Siams movement further towards democracy and minimal participation in World War I, Prince Vajiravudh was born on 1 January 1880 to Chulalongkorn and one of his four queens, Saovabha. In 1888, upon coming of age, Vajiravudh received the title Krom Khun Thep Dvaravati, Prince Vajiravudh was first educated in the royal palace in Siamese and English. In 1895, his half-brother Crown Prince Vajirunhis died and Vajiravudh was appointed the new Crown Prince of Siam and he continued his education in Britain, at the Royal Military College, Sandhurst in 1898 and was commissioned briefly in the Durham Light Infantry upon graduation. He studied law and history at Christ Church, Oxford in 1899, however, he suffered from appendicitis that barred him from graduating in 1901. On behalf of his father, King Chulalongkorn, he attended the coronation of King Edward VII on 9 August 1902, Crown Prince Vajiravudh returned to Siam in 1902 and in 1904 became a temporary monk, in accordance with Siamese tradition. In 1906, his father Chulalongkorn travelled to Europe to seek treatment for his lung disease, one of Crown Prince Vajiravudhs accomplishments during this regency was his supervision of the construction of the equestrian statue of King Chulalongkorn. Chulalongkorn died on 23 October 1910, and Vajiravudh succeeded his father as king of Siam, even before his coronation, Vajiravudh initiated several reforms. He organized Siams defence and established military academies and he created the rank of general for the first time in Siam, with his uncle, Prince Bhanurangsi Savangwongse as the first Siamese general. His first act following his accession to the throne was to build the Royal Pages College and it was built as an all-boy boarding school in the same tradition as English public schools such as Eton and Harrow. The school was instead of a royal monastery, formerly a custom of Thai kings. Later he also raised the Civil Servant School to Chulalongkorn Academy for Civil Officials, both Vajiravudh College and Chulalongkorn University still benefit from the funds that King Vajiravudh set aside for the use of the two elite institutions. He also improved Siamese healthcare systems and set up some of the earliest public hospitals in Siam, Vajira Hospital in 1912, in 1911, he established the Boy Scouts in Siam, disbanded in the latter part of his reign. On 11 November 1911, Vajiravudhs coronation was held with visiting royals from Europe and Japan as guests, later that year, the first airplane was flown in Siam. The early years of Vajiravudhs administration were dominated by his two uncles, Prince Damrong and Prince Devawongse, both of them Chulalongkorns right hand men. However, the king disagreed with Prince Damrong, Minister of Interior, Vajiravudh reformed his fathers monthon system by imposing the paks or regions over the administrative monthons. Each pak was governed by an Uparaja directly responsible to the king, the Uparaja presided over the intendants of monthons in the region—thus concentrating local administrative powers in his hands—much to the dismay of Prince Damrong. Radicals expected a new constitution upon the coronation of Vajiravudh, in 1911, the Wuchang Uprising that led to the fall of Qing dynasty prompted Siamese radicals to act
19.
League of Nations
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The League of Nations was an intergovernmental organisation founded on 10 January 1920 as a result of the Paris Peace Conference that ended the First World War. It was the first international organisation whose mission was to maintain world peace. Its primary goals, as stated in its Covenant, included preventing wars through collective security and disarmament, at its greatest extent from 28 September 1934 to 23 February 1935, it had 58 members. The diplomatic philosophy behind the League represented a shift from the preceding hundred years. The League lacked its own armed force and depended on the Great Powers to enforce its resolutions, keep to its economic sanctions, however, the Great Powers were often reluctant to do so. Sanctions could hurt League members, so they were reluctant to comply with them, after a number of notable successes and some early failures in the 1920s, the League ultimately proved incapable of preventing aggression by the Axis powers in the 1930s. Germany withdrew from the League, as did Japan, Italy, Spain, the onset of the Second World War showed that the League had failed its primary purpose, which was to prevent any future world war. The League lasted for 26 years, the United Nations replaced it after the end of the Second World War on 20 April 1946 and inherited a number of agencies and organisations founded by the League. As historians William H. Harbaugh and Ronald E. Powaski point out, the organisation was international in scope, with a third of the members of parliaments serving as members of the IPU by 1914. Its aims were to encourage governments to solve disputes by peaceful means. Annual conferences were held to help refine the process of international arbitration. Its structure consisted of a council headed by a president, which would later be reflected in the structure of the League, at the start of the 20th century, two power blocs emerged from alliances between the European Great Powers. It was these alliances that, at the start of the First World War in 1914 and this was the first major war in Europe between industrialised countries, and the first time in Western Europe that the results of industrialisation had been dedicated to war. By the time the fighting ended in November 1918, the war had had an impact, affecting the social, political and economic systems of Europe. Anti-war sentiment rose across the world, the First World War was described as the war to end all wars, the causes identified included arms races, alliances, militaristic nationalism, secret diplomacy, and the freedom of sovereign states to enter into war for their own benefit. Goldsworthy Lowes Dickinson, a British political scientist, coined the term League of Nations in 1914, together with Lord Bryce, he played a leading role in the founding of the group of internationalist pacifists known as the Bryce Group, later the League of Nations Union. The group became more influential among the public and as a pressure group within the then governing Liberal Party. In Dickinsons 1915 pamphlet After the War he wrote of his League of Peace as being essentially an organisation for arbitration and conciliation
20.
Chulalongkorn University
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Chulalongkorn University, abbreviated either CU or Chula, is a public and autonomous research university in Bangkok, Thailand. It is ranked as Thailands No.1 university from various organizers such as QS world university ranking, Round university ranking, the university was established in 1917, making it the oldest institute of higher education in Thailand. The university began taking shape during King Chulalongkorns reign when he founded the Royal Pages School in 1902 at The Grand Palace of Thailand, during the reign of his son, King Vajiravudh, the Royal Pages School became the Civil Service College of King Chulalongkorn. The Rockefeller Foundation was instrumental in helping the college from its academic foundation, on March 26,1917, King Vajiravudh renamed the college to Chulalongkorn University. Chulalongkorn University is a comprehensive and research-intensive university, according to QS university ranking 2016. CU is placed 252nd in the world, 45th in Asia, 1st in Thailand, Chulalongkorn University is one of the National Research Universities and supported by the Office of Nation Education Standards and Quality Assessment of Thailand. Moreover, CU is the only Thai university which is a member of Association of Pacific Rim Universities, admission to CU is highly selective, and applicants are required to have high test scores. Applicants ranking within the top 10 national scores is chosen for study at CU, CU comprises nineteen faculties, a School of Agriculture, three colleges, ten institutes and two other schools. Its campus occupies a vast area in downtown Bangkok, in 1899, the king founded the Civil Service Training School near the northern gate of the Royal Palace. Those who graduated from the school would become royal pages, being royal pages, they learned how to administer organizations by working closely with the king, which was a traditional way of entrance to Siamese bureaucracy. After being royal pages, they would serve in the Mahattai Ministry or other government ministries. On April 1,1902 the king thought the name of the school should be renamed to increase the dignity of students, Hence the name Royal Pages School was later used. The academic demands, however, increased all over the country as a whole as Siam was modernized, King Vajiravudh then took the remaining funds of Chulalongkorns Royal Equestrian Statue construction, which was collected from people. Then combined with his own funds to subsidize the construction of a university campus, the king organized various schools around the city proper into the Chulalongkorns College. The university firstly granted certificates to its graduates, the education for a degree was then prepared. The Rockefeller Foundation reorganized the curriculum of the Faculty of Medicine, in 1923, the Faculty of Medicine became the first faculty to accept students from the secondary education. The remaining faculties then followed suit, in 1938, the Chulalongkorn Universitys Preparatory School was founded to provide pre-collegiate education for its students. Those who managed to enter the university had to spend two years in the Preparatory School before going on to the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, the Preparatory School, however, ceased to be a university-owned preparatory school in 1947 and became independent Triam Udom Suksa School
21.
Greater East Asia Conference
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The event was also referred to as the Tokyo Conference. Most Japanese at the time seemed to have believed that Japan was an uniquely virtuous nation ruled over by an Emperor who was a living god. For this reason, any war waged by Japan was automatically viewed by the Japanese people as just and moral as the divine Emperor could never wage an unjust war. Within this context, many Japanese believed it was the mission of Japan to end white supremacy in Asia, Japanese propaganda stressed the theme of the mistreatment of Asians by whites to motivate their troops and sailors. Starting in 1931, Japan had always sought to justify its imperialism under the grounds of Pan-Asianism, as such, Japanese propaganda had proclaimed that the Imperial Army, guided by the emperors benevolence had come to China to engage in compassionate killing for the good of the Chinese people. At least some people within the Asian colonies of the European powers had welcomed the Japanese as liberators from the Europeans. In the Dutch East Indies, the nationalist leader Sukarno in 1942 had created the formula of the Three As-Japan the Light of Asia, Japan the Protector of Asia, several components of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere were not represented. In early 1943, the Japanese established the Greater East Asia Ministry to conduct relations with the independent states of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. Korea and Taiwan had long been annexed as external territories of the Empire of Japan, the issue of British Malaya and the Netherlands East Indies was complex. This action considerably undermined efforts to portray Japan as the liberator of the Asian peoples, in the end, seven countries participated. There were six independent participants and one observer that attended the Greater East Asia Conference, furthermore, the Kingdom of Thailand sent Prince Wan Waithayakon in place of Premier Plaek Pibulsonggram to emphasize that Thailand was not a country under Japanese domination. The Premier was also worried that he might be ousted should he leave Bangkok, Tojo greeted them with a speech praising the spiritual essence of Asia, as opposed to the materialistic civilization of the West. Their meeting was characterized by praise of solidarity and condemnation of Western colonialism, the purpose of these speeches was to reassure other Asian peoples about their future in a Japanese-dominated Greater East Asia Co-prosperity Sphere. The major theme of the conference was for the need for all the Asian peoples to rally behind Japan, the American historian John W. Dower wrote that the various delegates. placed the war in the East-versus-the West, Oriental-versus-the Occidental, and ultimately a blood-versus-blood context. Ba Maw later remembered, We were Asians rediscovering Asia, general Hideki Tojo of Japan stated in his speech, It is an incontrovertible fact that the nations of Greater East Asia are bound in every respect by ties of an inseparable relationship. Subhas Chandra Bose of India declared, If our Allies were to go down, Bose recalled that the atmosphere at the conference was like a family gathering as everybody was Asian, and he felt like they belonged together. Many Indians supported Japan, and throughout the conference Indian university students studying in Japan mobbed Bose like a idol, ba Maw maintained later on the Pan-Asian spirit of the 1943 conference lived after the war, becoming the basis of the 1955 Bandung conference. Mishra argued that the white powers guided by racism had behaved so brutally towards Asians that it was natural for Asians to look to Japan as a liberator from the white powers
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Prime Minister of Myanmar
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The Prime Minister of Myanmar was the head of government of Myanmar from 1948 to 2011. The position of Prime Minister was created in 1948, when Burma gained independence from the United Kingdom, since then, eleven people have held the office. Due to the long period of military rule, it has not been uncommon for the Prime Minister to be a serving military officer. The actual power of the Prime Minister has considerably varied over time, the position was abolished on 30 March 2011, according to the current Constitution. It provided that the President is both the head of state and head of government
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Ba Maw
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This article is about the Former Prime Minister and Head of State of Pre independent era of Myanmar. For the Burmese village, see List of villages in Myaungmya Township, Ba Maw was a Burmese political leader, active during the interwar and World War II period. Ba Maw was born in Maubin, Ba Maw came from a distinguished family of mixed Mon-Burmese parentage which bred many scholars and lawyers. One of his brothers, Dr Ba Han, was a lawyer as well as a lexicographer. In 1924 Ba Maw obtained his degree at the University of Calcutta & went on to obtain a doctoral degree from the University of Bordeaux. Ba Maw wrote his thesis in the French language on aspects of Buddhism in Burma. From the 1920s onwards Ba Maw practiced law and dabbled in colonial-era Burmese politics and he achieved prominence in 1931 when he defended the rebel leader, Saya San. Saya San had started a tax revolt in Burma in December 1930 which quickly grew into a widespread rebellion against British rule. Saya San was captured, tried, convicted and hanged, Ba Maw was among the top lawyers who defended Saya San. One of the judges that tried Saya San was another Burmese lawyer Ba U. Starting from the early 1930s Ba Maw became an advocate for Burmese self-rule. He at first opposed Burmas colonial separation from British India, and he opposed the participation of Great Britain, and by extension Burma, in World War II. He resigned from the Legislature and was arrested for sedition on 6 August 1940, Ba Maw spent over a year in jail as a political prisoner. He was incarcerated for most of the time in Mogok jail, during the early stages of World War II, from January – May 1942, Imperial Japanese Army quickly overran Burma, and after the capture of Rangoon, freed Ba Maw from prison. This Burmese Executive Administration was established on August 1,1942, as the war situation gradually turned against the Japanese, the Japanese government advanced its previously vague promise to grant Burma independence after the end of the war. The new state quickly declared war on the United Kingdom and the United States, Ba Maw fled just ahead of invading British troops via Thailand to Japan, where he was captured later that year by the American occupation authorities and was held in Sugamo Prison until 1946. He then was allowed to return to Burma, after Burma became independent of Great Britain and he was jailed briefly during 1947, for suspicion of involvement in the assassination of Aung San, but was soon released. After General Ne Win took over power in 1963 Ba Maw was again imprisoned from about 1965 or 1966 to February 1968
24.
Manchukuo
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Manchukuo was a puppet state in Northeast China and Inner Mongolia, which was governed under a form of constitutional monarchy. The area, collectively known as Manchuria by westerners and Japanese, was designated by Chinas erstwhile Qing Dynasty as the homeland of the familys ethnic group. In 1931, the region was seized by Japan following the Mukden Incident and a government was installed one year later with Puyi. Manchukuos government was abolished in 1945 after the defeat of Imperial Japan at the end of World War II, Manchus formed a minority in Manchukuo, whose largest ethnic group were Han Chinese. The population of Koreans increased during the Manchukuo period, and there were also Japanese, Mongols, White Russians, the Mongol regions of western Manchukuo were ruled under a slightly different system in acknowledgement of the Mongolian traditions there. The southern part of the Liaodong Peninsula was ruled by Japan as the Kwantung Leased Territory, Manchuria is a transcription of the Japanese reading of the Chinese word 滿洲 which means Manchuria, which in Japanese is Manshū, which in turn dates from the 19th century. The name Manzhou was invented and given to the Jurchen people by Hong Taiji in 1635 as a new name for their ethnic group. However, the name Manchuria was never used by the Manchus or the Qing dynasty itself to refer to their homeland, the name itself holding imperialistic connotation. According to Mark C. 满洲 then began to appear as a place names in more maps created by Japanese like Kondi Jūzō, Takahashi Kageyasu, Baba Sadayoshi and these maps were brought to Europe by the Dutch Philipp von Siebold. According to Bill Sewell, it was Europeans who first started using Manchuria as a name to refer to the location, the historian Gavan McCormack agreed with Robert H. G. Ordinary Manchus largely spurned Manchukuo which claimed to be established for their cause, the Japanese had their own motive for deliberately spreading the usage of the term Manchuria. The historian Norman Smith wrote that The term Manchuria is controversial, professor Mariko Asano Tamanoi said that she should use the term in quotation marks, when referring to Manchuria. Herbert Giles wrote that Manchuria was unknown to the Manchus themselves as a geographical expression, the Qing Dynasty, which replaced the Shun and Ming dynasties in China, was founded by Manchus from Manchuria. The Manchu emperors separated their homeland in Jilin and Heilongjiang from the Han Liaoning province with the Willow Palisade and this ethnic division continued until the Qing dynasty encouraged massive immigration of Han in the 19th century during Chuang Guandong to prevent the Russians from seizing the area from the Qing. After conquering the Ming, the Qing identified their state as China, the lands in Manchuria were explicitly stated by the Qing to belong to China in Qing edicts and in the Treaty of Nerchinsk. The area of Manchuria was then converted into three provinces by the late Qing government in 1907, as the power of the court in Beijing weakened, many outlying areas either broke free or fell under the control of Imperialist powers. In the 19th century, Imperial Russia was most interested in the lands of the Qing Empire. In 1858, Russia gained control over a tract of land called Outer Manchuria thanks to the Supplementary Treaty of Beijing that ended the Second Opium War
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Zhang Jinghui
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Zhang Jinghui, was a Chinese general and politician during the Warlord era. He is noted for his role in the Japanese puppet regime of Manchukuo in which he served as its second, Zhang Jinghui was born in Taian, southwest of Mukden, Liaoning Province. The area was a battlefield in the First Sino-Japanese War, and these forces were recruited as mercenaries by the Japanese during the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905. At that time, Zhang Jinghui was appointed commander of the Beiyang Army’s 27th Infantry Brigade, however, with the death of Yuan Shikai in 1916, the Beiyang Army split into several mutually hostile factions. Zhang Jinghui deserted Zhang Zuolin to join with Wu Peifus Zhili clique and he later rejoined Zhang Zuolin and served as his Minister of War in the Beiyang Government from May 1926 to June 1927. He then served as Minister of Enterprises in the Beiyang Government from June 1927 to June 1928, within the year he was appointed governor of the Harbin and China Eastern Railway Special District in northern Manchuria. Following the expulsion of pro-Kuomintang General Ma Zhanshan from Qiqihar, Zhang proclaimed his territory to be self-governing, however, his refusal to leave his stronghold in Harbin to take up residence in Qiqihar created friction with the Kwangtung Army leadership. However, when Ma Zhanshan agreed to terms with the Japanese on 14 February 1932 in exchange for the post of Governor of Heilongjiang Province, Ma later revolted in April 1932 and Zhang took his place as Minister of Defense of the Empire of Manchukuo. On 21 May 1935, Zhang succeeded Zheng Xiaoxu as Prime Minister of Manchukuo at the instigation of the Kwantung Army over the objections of Emperor Puyi, in 1943, he was the official delegate from Manchukuo to the Greater East Asia Conference held in Tokyo. Zhang held the position of Prime Minister until the collapse of Manchukuo following the Soviet Red Armys invasion of Manchuria in August 1945 and he died of heart failure nine years later in 1959. The Manchurian Myth, Nationalism, Resistance, and Collaboration in Modern China, IMTFE Judgement, Invasion & Occupation of Manchuria Photo at World War II Database
26.
Wang Jingwei
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Wang Jingwei, born as Wang Zhaoming, but widely known by his pen name Jingwei, was a Chinese politician. His political orientation veered sharply to the later in his career after he joined the Japanese. Wang was an associate of Sun Yat-sen for the last twenty years of Suns life. After Suns death Wang engaged in a struggle with Chiang Kai-shek for control over the Kuomintang. Wang served as the head of state for this Japanese puppet government until he died, born in Sanshui, Guangdong, but of Zhejiang origin, Wang went to Japan as an international student sponsored by the Qing Dynasty government in 1903, and joined the Tongmenghui in 1905. As a young man, Wang came to blame the Qing dynasty for holding China back, while in Japan, Wang became a close confidant of Sun Yat-sen, and would later go on to become one of the most important members of the early Kuomintang. In the years leading up to the Xinhai Revolution in 1911, Wang gained prominence during this period as an excellent public speaker and a staunch advocate of Chinese nationalism. He was jailed for plotting an assassination of the regent, Prince Chun and he remained in jail from 1910 until the Wuchang Uprising the next year, and became something of a national hero upon his release. During and after the Xinhai Revolution, Wangs political life was defined by his opposition to Western imperialism and he is believed by many to have drafted Suns will during the short period before Suns death, in the winter of 1925. He was considered one of the contenders to replace Sun as leader of the KMT. Wang had clearly lost control of the KMT by 1926, when, following the Zhongshan Warship Incident, Chiang successfully sent Wang, during the Northern Expedition, Wang was the leading figure in the left-leaning faction of the KMT that called for continued cooperation with the Chinese Communist Party. Although Wang collaborated closely with Chinese communists in Wuhan, he was opposed to communism. He did not believe that Communists could be true patriots or true Chinese nationalists, in early 1927, shortly before Chiang captured Shanghai and moved the capital to Nanjing, Wangs faction declared the capital of the Republic to be Wuhan. Wang later blamed the failure of his Wuhan government on its adoption of communist agendas. Wangs regime was opposed by Chiang Kai-shek, who was in the midst of a purge of communists in Shanghai and was calling for a push farther north. The separation between the governments of Wang and Chiang are known as the Ninghan Separation, Chiang Kai-shek occupied Shanghai in April 1927, and began a bloody suppression of suspected communists known as the White Terror. Fearing retribution as a communist sympathiser, Wang publicly claimed allegiance to Chiang, between 1929 and 1930, Wang collaborated with Feng Yuxiang and Yan Xishan to form a central government in opposition to the one headed by Chiang. Wang took part in a conference hosted by Yan to draft a new constitution, and was to serve as the Prime Minister under Yan, Wangs attempts to aid Yans government ended when Chiang defeated the alliance in the Central Plains War
27.
Prime Minister of Japan
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The Prime Minister of Japan is the head of government of Japan. The Prime Minister is appointed by the Emperor of Japan after being designated by the National Diet and he or she is the head of the Cabinet and appoints and dismisses the other Ministers of State. The literal translation of the Japanese name for the office is Minister for the Comprehensive Administration of the Cabinet, prior to the adoption of the Meiji Constitution, Japan had in practice no written constitution. Originally, a Chinese-inspired legal system known as ritsuryō was enacted in the late Asuka period, theoretically, the last ritsuryō code, the Yōrō Code enacted in 752, was still in force at the time of the Meiji Restoration. It took its current form with the adoption of the Constitution of Japan in 1947, to date,62 people have served this position. The current Prime Minister is Shinzō Abe, who re-took office on December 26,2012 and he is the first former Prime Minister to return to office since 1948, and the 6th longest serving member to date. The Prime Minister is designated by both houses of the Diet, before the conduct of any other business, for that purpose, each conducts a ballot under the run-off system. If the two houses choose different individuals, then a joint committee of both houses is appointed to agree on a common candidate. Ultimately, however, if the two houses do not agree within ten days, the decision of the House of Representatives is deemed to be that of the Diet, therefore, the House of Representatives can theoretically ensure the appointment of any Prime Minister it wants. The candidate is presented with their commission, and formally appointed to office by the Emperor. Must be a member of house of the Diet. Note that former officers from the World War II-era may be appointed prime minister despite the civilian requirement. Exercises control and supervision over the executive branch. Presents bills to the Diet on behalf of the Cabinet, appoints all Cabinet ministers, and can dismiss them at any time. May permit legal action to be taken against Cabinet ministers, must make reports on domestic and foreign relations to the Diet. Must report to the Diet upon demand to provide answers or explanations, may advise the Emperor to dissolve the Diets House of Representatives. Presides over meetings of the Cabinet, commander in chief of the Japan Self-Defense Forces. May override a court injunction against an act upon showing of cause
28.
Hideki Tojo
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After the end of the war, Tojo was arrested, sentenced to death for Japanese war crimes by the International Military Tribunal for the Far East, and hanged on December 23,1948. Hideki Tojo was born in the Kōjimachi district of Tokyo on December 30,1884, as the 3rd son of Hidenori Tojo, under the bakufu, Japanese society was divided rigidly into four castes, the merchants, peasants, artisans and the samurai. The Tojo family came from the caste, through the Tojos were relatively lowly warrior retainers for the great damiyos that they had served for generations. Tojos father was a samurai turned Army officer and his mother was the daughter of a Buddhist priest, making his family very respectable, Tojo had an education typical of a Japanese youth in the Meiji era. Japanese girls who were taught it was the highest honor for a woman to have as many sons as possible who could die for the Emperor in war. Japanese schools in the Meiji era were very competitive, and there was no tradition of sympathy with failures, Tojo was of average intelligence, but he was known to compensate for his limited intelligence with a willingness to work extremely hard. Tojos boyhood hero was the 17th century shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu who issued the injunction, Avoid the things you like, Tojo liked to say, I am just an ordinary man possessing no shining talents. Anything I have achieved I owe to my capacity for hard work, in 1899, Tojo entered the Army Cadet School. When he graduated from the Japanese Military Academy in March 1905 he was commissioned as a lieutenant in the infantry of the IJA. Tojos anger at the Treaty of Portsmouth left him with a dislike of Americans. In 1909, Tojo married Katsuko Ito, with whom he would have three sons and four daughters, in 1918-19, Tojo briefly served in Siberia as part of the Japanese expeditionary force sent to intervene in the Russian Civil War. Tojo served as Japanese military attache to Germany between 1919-1922, a stern, humorless man, Tojo was known for his brusque manner, his obsession with etiquette, and for his coldness. Tojo wrote with bitterness at the time that American whites would never accept Asians as equals, Japan, too, has to be strong to survive in the world. By 1928, he had become the chief of the Japanese Army. He began to take an interest in militarist politics during his command of the 8th Infantry Regiment. Reflecting the hermaphrodite imagery often used in Japan to describe people in power, Tojo often visited the homes of the men under his command, assisted his men with personal problems and made loans to officers short of money. In 1934, Tojo was promoted to general and served as Chief of the Personnel Department within the Army Ministry. Tojo wrote a chapter in the book Hijōji kokumin zenshū, a book published in March 1934 by the Army Ministry calling for Japan to become a national defense state
29.
President of the Philippines
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The President of the Philippines is the head of state and head of government of the Philippines. The President leads the executive branch of the Philippine government and is the commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, Filipinos refer to their President as Pangulo or Presidente. The President serves a single, fixed, six-year term without possibility of re-election, in Filipino, one of the two official languages of the Philippines, the President is referred to as Pangulo. In the other languages of the Philippines such as the Visayan languages. Depending on the chosen for these terms, a number of persons could alternatively be considered the inaugural holder of the office. Andrés Bonifacio could be considered the first President of a united Philippines since he was the third Supreme President of the Katipunan and its Supreme Council, led by the Supreme President, coordinated provincial and district councils. When the Katipunan started a revolt against the Spanish colonial government in August 1896. While the term Katipunan remained, Bonifacios government was known as the Tagalog Republic. Bonifacios revolutionary government never controlled territory for any significant period. Some historians contend that including Bonifacio as a past president would imply that Macario Sacay, in March 1897, during the Philippine Revolution against Spain Emilio Aguinaldo was elected president of the revolutionary government at the Tejeros Convention. The new government was meant to replace the Katipunan, though the latter was not formally abolished until 1899, Aguinaldo was again elected President at Biak-na-Bato in November, leading the Republic of Biak-na-Bato. Aguinaldo therefore signed the Pact of Biak-na-Bato and went into exile in Hong Kong at the end of 1897, in April 1898, the Spanish–American War broke out, and the Asiatic Squadron of the United States Navy sailed for the Philippines. At the Battle of Manila Bay on May 1,1898 the American Navy decisively defeated the Spanish Navy effectively ending Spanish rule in the Philippines, aquinaldo subsequently returned to the Philippines aboard a U. S. Navy vessel and renewed the revolution. He formed a government on May 24,1898 and issued the Philippine Declaration of Independence on June 12,1898. On June 23,1898, Aguinaldo transformed his government into a revolutionary government. On January 23,1899, he was then elected President of the First Philippine Republic, consequently, this government is also called the Malolos Republic. The First Philippine Republic was short-lived and never internationally recognized, the Philippines was transferred from Spanish to American control by the Treaty of Paris of 1898, signed in December of that year. The Philippine–American War broke out between the United States and Aguinaldos government and his government effectively ceased to exist on April 1,1901, after he pledged allegiance to the United States following his capture by U. S. forces in March
30.
Subhas Chandra Bose
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Bose had been a leader of the younger, radical, wing of the Indian National Congress in the late 1920s and 1930s, rising to become Congress President in 1938 and 1939. However, he was ousted from Congress leadership positions in 1939 following differences with Mahatma Gandhi and he was subsequently placed under house arrest by the British before escaping from India in 1940. In November 1941, with German funds, a Free India Centre was set up in Berlin, a 3, 000-strong Free India Legion, comprising Indians captured by Erwin Rommels Afrika Korps, was also formed to aid in a possible future German land invasion of India. By spring 1942, in light of Japanese victories in southeast Asia and changing German priorities, a German invasion of India became untenable, adolf Hitler, during his only meeting with Bose in late May 1942, suggested the same, and offered to arrange for a submarine. During this time Bose also became a father, his wife, or companion, Emilie Schenkl, identifying strongly with the Axis powers, and no longer apologetically, Bose boarded a German submarine in February 1943. In Madagascar, he was transferred to a Japanese submarine from which he disembarked in Japanese-held Sumatra in May 1943, with Japanese support, Bose revamped the Indian National Army, then composed of Indian soldiers of the British Indian army who had been captured in the Battle of Singapore. To these, after Boses arrival, were added enlisting Indian civilians in Malaya, the Japanese had come to support a number of puppet and provisional governments in the captured regions, such as those in Burma, the Philippines and Manchukuo. Before long the Provisional Government of Free India, presided by Bose, was formed in the Japanese-occupied Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Bose had great drive and charisma—creating popular Indian slogans, such as Jai Hind, —and the INA under Bose was a model of diversity by region, ethnicity, religion, however, Bose was regarded by the Japanese as being militarily unskilled, and his military effort was short-lived. In late 1944 and early 1945 the British Indian Army first halted, almost half the Japanese forces and fully half the participating INA contingent were killed. The INA was driven down the Malay Peninsula, and surrendered with the recapture of Singapore and he died from third degree burns received when his plane crashed in Taiwan. Some Indians, however, did not believe that the crash had occurred, with many among them, especially in Bengal, Indian National Congress, the main instrument of Indian nationalism, praised Boses patriotism but distanced itself from his tactics and ideology, especially his collaboration with Fascism. Subhas Chandra Bose was born on 23 January 1897 in Cuttack, Orissa Division, Bengal Province, to Prabhavati Devi and Janakinath Bose and he was the ninth in a family of 14 children. He was admitted to the Protestant European School, like his brothers and sisters and he continued his studies at this school which was run by the Baptist Mission up to 1909 and then shifted to the Ravenshaw Collegiate School. The day Subhas was admitted to school, Beni Madhab Das. After securing the position in the matriculation examination in 1913. His nationalistic temperament came to light when he was expelled for assaulting Professor Oaten for the latters anti-India comments and he later joined the Scottish Church College at the University of Calcutta and passed his B. A. in 1918 in philosophy. Bose left India in 1919 for England with a promise to his father that he would appear in the Indian Civil Services examination and he went to study in Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge and matriculated on 19 November 1919
31.
World War II
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World War II, also known as the Second World War, was a global war that lasted from 1939 to 1945, although related conflicts began earlier. It involved the vast majority of the worlds countries—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing alliances, the Allies and the Axis. It was the most widespread war in history, and directly involved more than 100 million people from over 30 countries. Marked by mass deaths of civilians, including the Holocaust and the bombing of industrial and population centres. These made World War II the deadliest conflict in human history, from late 1939 to early 1941, in a series of campaigns and treaties, Germany conquered or controlled much of continental Europe, and formed the Axis alliance with Italy and Japan. Under the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact of August 1939, Germany and the Soviet Union partitioned and annexed territories of their European neighbours, Poland, Finland, Romania and the Baltic states. In December 1941, Japan attacked the United States and European colonies in the Pacific Ocean, and quickly conquered much of the Western Pacific. The Axis advance halted in 1942 when Japan lost the critical Battle of Midway, near Hawaii, in 1944, the Western Allies invaded German-occupied France, while the Soviet Union regained all of its territorial losses and invaded Germany and its allies. During 1944 and 1945 the Japanese suffered major reverses in mainland Asia in South Central China and Burma, while the Allies crippled the Japanese Navy, thus ended the war in Asia, cementing the total victory of the Allies. World War II altered the political alignment and social structure of the world, the United Nations was established to foster international co-operation and prevent future conflicts. The victorious great powers—the United States, the Soviet Union, China, the United Kingdom, the Soviet Union and the United States emerged as rival superpowers, setting the stage for the Cold War, which lasted for the next 46 years. Meanwhile, the influence of European great powers waned, while the decolonisation of Asia, most countries whose industries had been damaged moved towards economic recovery. Political integration, especially in Europe, emerged as an effort to end pre-war enmities, the start of the war in Europe is generally held to be 1 September 1939, beginning with the German invasion of Poland, Britain and France declared war on Germany two days later. The dates for the beginning of war in the Pacific include the start of the Second Sino-Japanese War on 7 July 1937, or even the Japanese invasion of Manchuria on 19 September 1931. Others follow the British historian A. J. P. Taylor, who held that the Sino-Japanese War and war in Europe and its colonies occurred simultaneously and this article uses the conventional dating. Other starting dates sometimes used for World War II include the Italian invasion of Abyssinia on 3 October 1935. The British historian Antony Beevor views the beginning of World War II as the Battles of Khalkhin Gol fought between Japan and the forces of Mongolia and the Soviet Union from May to September 1939, the exact date of the wars end is also not universally agreed upon. It was generally accepted at the time that the war ended with the armistice of 14 August 1945, rather than the formal surrender of Japan
32.
Southeast Asia Treaty Organization
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The formal institution of SEATO was established on 19 February 1955 at a meeting of treaty partners in Bangkok, Thailand The organizations headquarters were also in Bangkok. SEATO was dissolved on 30 June 1977 after many members lost interest and these treaties and agreements were intended to create alliances that would contain communist powers. This policy was considered to have largely developed by American diplomat. The organization, headquartered in Bangkok, was created in 1955 at the first meeting of the Council of Ministers set up by the treaty, also present were committees for economics, security, and information. Unlike the NATO alliance, SEATO had no joint commands with standing forces. S. military intervention in the region during the Vietnam War, despite its name, SEATO mostly included countries located outside of the region but with an interest either in the region or the organization itself. They were Australia, France, New Zealand, Pakistan, the Philippines, Thailand, the United Kingdom, the Philippines and Thailand were the only Southeast Asian countries that actually participated in the organization. Both shared close ties with the United States, particularly the Philippines, Thailand became a member upon the discovery of the newly founded Thai Autonomous Region in Yunnan - apparently feeling threatened by potential Chinese communist subversion on its land. Other regional countries like Burma and Indonesia were far more minded with domestic internal stability rather than concern of communist threat, malaya also chose to not participate formally, though it was kept updated with key developments due to its close relationship with the United Kingdom. S. Cambodia, however rejected the protection in 1956, the majority of SEATO members were not located in Southeast Asia. To Australia and New Zealand, SEATO was seen as a more satisfying organization than ANZUS – a collective defense organization with the U. S. Great Britain and France joined partly due to having long maintained colonies in the region, Pakistan, however, was simply interested in joining over the appeal of potential support for its long struggle against India. Last but not least, the U. S. upon perceiving Southeast Asia to be a frontier for Cold War geopolitics saw the establishment of SEATO as essential to its Cold War containment policy. All in all, the membership reflected a mid-1950s combination of anti-communist Western nations, the United Kingdom, France and the United States, the latter of which joined after the U. S. Senate ratified the treaty by an 82–1 vote, represented the strongest Western powers. Canada also considered joining, but decided against it in order to concentrate on its NATO responsibilities, secretaries-General of SEATO, After its creation, SEATO quickly became insignificant militarily, as most of its member nations contributed very little to the alliance. While SEATO military forces held joint military training, they were never employed because of internal disagreements, SEATO was unable to intervene in conflicts in Laos because France and Britain rejected use of military action. As a result, the U. S. provided unilateral support for Laos after 1962, though sought by the U. S. involvement of SEATO in the Vietnam War was denied because of lack of British and French cooperation. Both the United States and Australia cited the alliance as justification for involvement in Vietnam, American membership in SEATO provided the United States with a rationale for a large-scale U. S. military intervention in Southeast Asia. Other countries, such as Great Britain and key nations in Asia, in 1962, as part of its commitment to SEATO, the Royal Australian Air Force deployed CAC Sabres of its No.79 Squadron to Ubon Royal Thai Air Force Base, Thailand
33.
Bandung Conference
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The twenty-nine countries that participated at the Bandung Conference represented nearly one-quarter of the Earths land surface and a total population of 1.5 billion people. The conference was organised by Indonesia, Burma, Pakistan, Ceylon, the conferences stated aims were to promote Afro-Asian economic and cultural cooperation and to oppose colonialism or neocolonialism by any nation. The conference was an important step toward the Non-Aligned Movement, the conference of Bandung was preceded by the Bogor Conference. This was the seed for the Colombo Plan and Bandung Conference, the 2nd Bogor Conference was held December 28–29,1954. Soekarno, the first president of the Republic of Indonesia, portrayed himself as the leader of group of states. His daughter, Megawati Soekarnoputri has been head of the PDI-P party during both summit anniversaries, and the President of Indonesia Joko Widodo during the 3rd summit is a member of her party, plans for the conference were announced in December 1954. The 2nd Asian-African Conference Summit took place in Jakarta and Bandung, the 2005 conference results in the NAWASILA and the establishment of the NAASP. Of the 106 nations invited to the summit,89 are represented by their heads of state or government or ministers. The 3rd, or 60th Anniversary Conference Summit was held in Bandung and Jakarta from 21–25 April 2015, with the theme Strengthening South-South Cooperation to Promote World Peace, delegates from 109 Asian and African countries,16 observer countries and 25 international organizations participated. Major debate centered around the question of whether Soviet policies in Eastern Europe, a consensus was reached in which colonialism in all of its manifestations was condemned, implicitly censuring the Soviet Union, as well as the West. China played an important role in the conference and strengthened its relations with other Asian nations, zhou also signed an agreement on dual nationality with Indonesian foreign minister Sunario. The US security establishment also feared that the Conference would expand Chinas regional power, the OIR and USIA followed a course of Image Management for the US, using overt and covert propaganda to portray the US as friendly and to warn participants of the Communist menace. The United States, at the urging of Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, however, the administration issued a series of statements during the lead-up to the Conference. These suggested that the US would provide aid, and attempted to reframe the issue of colonialism as a threat by China. Representative Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. attended the conference, sponsored by Ebony, Powell spoke at some length in favor of American foreign policy there which assisted the United Statess standing with the Non-Aligned. When Powell returned to the United States, he urged President Dwight D. Eisenhower and Congress to oppose colonialism, African American author Richard Wright attended the conference with funding from the Congress for Cultural Freedom. Wrights essays on the trip appeared in several Congress for Cultural Freedom magazines, several of the artists and intellectuals with whom Wright interacted continued discussing Wrights visit after he left Indonesia. The conference was followed by the Afro-Asian Peoples Solidarity Conference in Cairo in September and the Belgrade Conference, in later years, conflicts between the nonaligned nations eroded the solidarity expressed at Bandung
34.
Pali
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Pali is a Prakrit language native to the Indian subcontinent. It is widely studied because it is the language of much of the earliest extant literature of Buddhism as collected in the Pāli Canon or Tipiṭaka and is the language of Theravāda Buddhism. The word Pali is used as a name for the language of the Theravada canon, Childers translates the word as series and states that the language bears the epithet in consequence of the perfection of its grammatical structure. However, modern scholarship has regarded Pali as a mix of several Prakrit languages from around the 3rd century BCE, combined together and partially Sanskritized. The closest artifacts to Pali that have found in India are Edicts of Ashoka found at Gujarat, in the west of India. There is persistent confusion as to the relation of Pāḷi to the vernacular spoken in the ancient kingdom of Magadha, Pali, as a Middle Indo-Aryan language, is different from Sanskrit more with regard to its dialectal base than the time of its origin. A number of its morphological and lexical features show that it is not a continuation of Ṛgvedic Vedic Sanskrit. Instead it descends from one or more dialects that were, despite many similarities, however, this view is not shared by all scholars. Some, like A. C. Woolner, believe that Pali is derived from Vedic Sanskrit, Paiśācī is a largely unattested literary language of classical India that is mentioned in Prakrit and Sanskrit grammars of antiquity. e. Evidence which lends support to this interpretation is that literature in Paiśācī is fragmentary and extremely rare, many Theravada sources refer to the Pali language as Magadhan or the language of Magadha. This identification first appears in the commentaries, and may have been an attempt by Buddhists to associate more closely with the Maurya Empire. The Buddha taught in Magadha, but the four most important places in his life are all outside of it and it is likely that he taught in several closely related dialects of Middle Indo-Aryan, which had a high degree of mutual intelligibility. There is no attested dialect of Middle Indo-Aryan with all the features of Pali, Pali has some commonalities with both the western Ashokan Edicts at Girnar in Saurashtra, and the Central-Western Prakrit found in the eastern Hathigumpha inscription. In Sri Lanka, Pali is thought to have entered into a period of decline ending around the 4th or 5th century, the work of Buddhaghosa was largely responsible for its reemergence as an important scholarly language in Buddhist thought. Another scholar states that at time it was a refined. Modern scholarship has not arrived at a consensus on the issue, after the death of the Buddha, Pali may have evolved among Buddhists out of the language of the Buddha as a new artificial language. According to K. R. Norman, it is likely that the viharas in North India had separate collections of material, in the early period it is likely that no degree of translation was necessary in communicating this material to other areas. Around the time of Ashoka there had been more linguistic divergence, following this period, the language underwent a small degree of Sanskritisation
35.
Sanskrit
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Sanskrit is the primary liturgical language of Hinduism, a philosophical language of Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism, and a literary language and lingua franca of ancient and medieval South Asia. As a result of transmission of Hindu and Buddhist culture to Southeast Asia and parts of Central Asia, as one of the oldest Indo-European languages for which substantial written documentation exists, Sanskrit holds a prominent position in Indo-European studies. The body of Sanskrit literature encompasses a rich tradition of poetry and drama as well as scientific, technical, philosophical, the compositions of Sanskrit were orally transmitted for much of its early history by methods of memorization of exceptional complexity, rigor, and fidelity. Thereafter, variants and derivatives of the Brahmi script came to be used, Sanskrit is today one of the 22 languages listed in the Eighth Schedule of the Constitution of India, which mandates the Indian government to develop the language. It continues to be used as a ceremonial language in Hindu religious rituals and Buddhist practice in the form of hymns. The Sanskrit verbal adjective sáṃskṛta- may be translated as refined, elaborated, as a term for refined or elaborated speech, the adjective appears only in Epic and Classical Sanskrit in the Manusmṛti and the Mahabharata. The pre-Classical form of Sanskrit is known as Vedic Sanskrit, with the language of the Rigveda being the oldest and most archaic stage preserved, Classical Sanskrit is the standard register as laid out in the grammar of Pāṇini, around the fourth century BCE. Sanskrit, as defined by Pāṇini, evolved out of the earlier Vedic form, the present form of Vedic Sanskrit can be traced back to as early as the second millennium BCE. Scholars often distinguish Vedic Sanskrit and Classical or Pāṇinian Sanskrit as separate dialects, although they are quite similar, they differ in a number of essential points of phonology, vocabulary, grammar and syntax. Vedic Sanskrit is the language of the Vedas, a collection of hymns, incantations and theological and religio-philosophical discussions in the Brahmanas. Modern linguists consider the metrical hymns of the Rigveda Samhita to be the earliest, for nearly 2000 years, Sanskrit was the language of a cultural order that exerted influence across South Asia, Inner Asia, Southeast Asia, and to a certain extent East Asia. A significant form of post-Vedic Sanskrit is found in the Sanskrit of Indian epic poetry—the Ramayana, the deviations from Pāṇini in the epics are generally considered to be on account of interference from Prakrits, or innovations, and not because they are pre-Paninian. Traditional Sanskrit scholars call such deviations ārṣa, meaning of the ṛṣis, in some contexts, there are also more prakritisms than in Classical Sanskrit proper. There were four principal dialects of classical Sanskrit, paścimottarī, madhyadeśī, pūrvi, the predecessors of the first three dialects are attested in Vedic Brāhmaṇas, of which the first one was regarded as the purest. In the 2001 Census of India,14,035 Indians reported Sanskrit to be their first language, in India, Sanskrit is among the 14 original languages of the Eighth Schedule to the Constitution. The state of Uttarakhand in India has ruled Sanskrit as its official language. In October 2012 social activist Hemant Goswami filed a petition in the Punjab. More than 3,000 Sanskrit works have been composed since Indias independence in 1947, much of this work has been judged of high quality, in comparison to both classical Sanskrit literature and modern literature in other Indian languages
36.
Royal Society of Thailand
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The Royal Society of Thailand, formerly known as the Royal Society of Siam, is the national academy of Thailand in charge of academic works of the government. The secretariat of the society is the Office of the Royal Society of Thailand, the office is an independent department in the executive branch of Thailand and is not subject to any other agency. The Royal Society of Siam was established on 19 April 1926 and was dissolved on 31 March 1933, the dissolved society was split into the Royal Institute of Thailand and the Fine Arts Department of Thailand. On 14 February 2015, the Royal Institute of Thailand was reorganised and its administrative council became the Royal Society of Thailand, whilst the institute itself became the office of the society. According to the present structure, the members of the Royal Society of Thailand are of three types, associate fellows, fellows, and honorary fellows, the associate fellows are experts selected and appointed by the society. The fellows are associate fellows selected by the society and appointed by the monarch upon advice of the prime minister, and the honorary fellows are prominent experts selected by the society and appointed in the same manner as the fellows. On 19 April 1926, the Royal Society of Siam was established by King Prajadhipok, the society was later dissolved on 31 March 1933 and its divisions were incorporated into two new agencies. The academic divisions became the Royal Institute of Thailand, the archaeological divisions became the Fine Arts Department of Thailand. According to the Act on Royal Institute,1934, which took effect on 24 April 1933, the institute was a legal person sponsored by the government and the prime minister was in charge of the institute. Under the act, the members were selected by the institute itself and were appointed by the monarch upon approval of the cabinet. On 1 April 1942, the Royal Institute Act,1942, the act changed the status of the institute from a legal person to a public organisation and authorised the prime minister to directly command the institute. The act also modified the method of selecting the institute members, the members were selected and nominated to the monarch by the prime minister. On 31 December 1944, the Royal Institute Act,1944 and it again modified the institute status and the member selection method. On 12 March 1952, the Administrative Reorganisation Act,1952 and it changed the commander of the institute from the prime minister to the culture minister. On 1 September 1958, the Administrative Reorganisation Act,1958 and it again changed the commander of the institute from the culture minister to the education minister. On 13 November 2001, the Royal Institute Act,2001, under the act, the institute was a government department which was not subject to any other agency. The act also improved the structure of the institute and increased its missions, on 14 February 2015, the Royal Society Act,2015, came into force and reorganised the institute. The act granted many new powers to the office, including the powers to manage its own budgets, to advanced training in all fields of the society
37.
Philology
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Philology is the study of language in written historical sources, it is a combination of literary criticism, history, and linguistics. It is more defined as the study of literary texts and written records, the establishment of their authenticity and their original form. A person who pursues this kind of study is known as a philologist, in older usage, especially British, philology is more general, covering comparative and historical linguistics. Indo-European studies involves the comparative philology of all Indo-European languages, Philology, with its focus on historical development, is contrasted with linguistics due to Ferdinand de Saussures insistence on the importance of synchronic analysis. The contrast continued with the emergence of structuralism and Chomskyan linguistics alongside its emphasis on syntax, the term changed little with the Latin philologia, and later entered the English language in the 16th century, from the Middle French philologie, in the sense of love of literature. The adjective φιλόλογος meant fond of discussion or argument, talkative, in Hellenistic Greek also implying an excessive preference of argument over the love of true wisdom, as an allegory of literary erudition, Philologia appears in 5th-century post-classical literature, an idea revived in Late Medieval literature. The meaning of love of learning and literature was narrowed to the study of the development of languages in 19th-century usage of the term. Most continental European countries still maintain the term to designate departments, colleges, position titles, J. R. R. Tolkien opposed the nationalist reaction against philological practices, claiming that the philological instinct was universal as is the use of language. Based on the critique of Friedrich Nietzsche, US scholars since the 1980s have viewed philology as responsible for a narrowly scientistic study of language. The comparative linguistics branch of philology studies the relationship between languages, similarities between Sanskrit and European languages were first noted in the early 16th century and led to speculation of a common ancestor language from which all these descended. Philology also includes the study of texts and their history and it includes elements of textual criticism, trying to reconstruct an authors original text based on variant copies of manuscripts. Since that time, the principles of textual criticism have been improved and applied to other widely distributed texts such as the Bible. Scholars have tried to reconstruct the original readings of the Bible from the manuscript variants and this method was applied to Classical Studies and to medieval texts as a way to reconstruct the authors original work. A related study method known as higher criticism studies the authorship, date, as these philological issues are often inseparable from issues of interpretation, there is no clear-cut boundary between philology and hermeneutics. When text has a significant political or religious influence, scholars have difficulty reaching objective conclusions, some scholars avoid all critical methods of textual philology, especially in historical linguistics, where it is important to study the actual recorded materials. Supporters of New Philology insist on a diplomatic approach, a faithful rendering of the text exactly as found in the manuscript. Another branch of philology, cognitive philology, studies written and oral texts and this science compares the results of textual science with the results of experimental research of both psychology and artificial intelligence production systems. In the case of Bronze Age literature, philology includes the prior decipherment of the language under study and this has notably been the case with the Egyptian, Sumerian, Assyrian, Hittite, Ugaritic and Luwian languages
38.
Textual criticism
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Textual criticism is a branch of textual scholarship, philology, and literary criticism that is concerned with the identification of textual variants in either manuscripts or printed books. Ancient scribes made alterations when copying manuscripts by hand, given a manuscript copy, several or many copies, but not the original document, the textual critic might seek to reconstruct the original text as closely as possible. The same processes can be used to attempt to reconstruct intermediate versions, or recensions, the ultimate objective of the textual critics work is the production of a critical edition containing a scholarly curated text. There are three approaches to textual criticism, eclecticism, stemmatics, and copy-text editing. Techniques from the discipline of cladistics are currently also being used to determine the relationships between manuscripts. Textual criticism has been practiced for two thousand years. Early textual critics were concerned with preserving the works of antiquity, many ancient works, such as the Bible and the Greek tragedies, survive in hundreds of copies, and the relationship of each copy to the original may be unclear. Textual scholars have debated for centuries which sources are most closely derived from the original, hence which readings in those sources are correct. Although biblical books that are letters, like Greek plays, presumably had one original, interest in applying textual criticism to the Quran has also developed after the discovery of the Sanaa manuscripts in 1972, which possibly date back to the 7–8th centuries. However, the application of textual criticism to non-religious works does not antedate the invention of printing, while Christianity has been relatively receptive to textual criticism, application of it to the Jewish Torah and the Quran is, to the devout, taboo. The business of textual criticism is to produce a text as close as possible to the original, Maas comments further that A dictation revised by the author must be regarded as equivalent to an autograph manuscript. The lack of autograph manuscripts applies to many cultures other than Greek, in such a situation, a key objective becomes the identification of the first exemplar before any split in the tradition. That exemplar is known as the archetype, if we succeed in establishing the text of, the constitutio is considerably advanced. The textual critics ultimate objective is the production of a critical edition and this contains the text that the author has determined most closely approximates the original, and is accompanied by an apparatus criticus or critical apparatus. Before mechanical printing, literature was copied by hand, and many variations were introduced by copyists, the age of printing made the scribal profession effectively redundant. Printed editions, while less susceptible to the proliferation of variations likely to arise during manual transmission, are not immune to introducing variations from an authors autograph. Instead of a scribe miscopying his source, a compositor or a shop may read or typeset a work in a way that differs from the autograph. Since each scribe or printer commits different errors, reconstruction of the lost original is often aided by a selection of readings taken from many sources, an edited text that draws from multiple sources is said to be eclectic
39.
Order of the Defender of the Realm
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The Most Esteemed Order of the Defender of the Realm is a Malaysian federal award presented for meritorious service to the country. The Order Motto are Dipeliharakan Allah-Pangkuan Negara, the order was instituted on 6 August 1958 and initially had the five highest ranks. The medal was added on 19 August 1960, the order has six ranks, Grand Commander of the Order of the Defender of the Realm. This rank is limited to 25 recipients, except foreign citizens who are conferred honorary awards, the recipient of this award receives the title Tun and his wife Toh Puan. The collar comprises the crests of the states in Malaysia with a star made of gold-plated silver. The ribbon is of blue silk and has yellow stripes on both the edges. It has a white stipe, charged with a smaller red stripe in its middle. Commander of the Order of the Defender of the Realm It is limited to 75 recipients, the recipient of this award receives the title Tan Sri and the recipients wife takes the title of Puan Sri. The Star is made of gold-plated silver and so is the badge, the ribbon has white stripes on both the edges and red stripes in the centre. The red stripes lie on the yellow stripes, the end of the ribbon is tied with a ribbon and the badge suspends from below the ribbon. Companion of the Order of the Defender of the Realm Recipients are limited to 700 only and it does not carry any title. The badge of the Johan Mangku Negara is a star made of gold-plated silver. Each point is white and in between are a star and crescent moon and they are made of gold-plated silver. In the centre of the star is a white circle decorated with carvings of the Malaysian Royal Crown, the badge has a radius of 2¼ inches. It suspends from a ribbon which is of the colour as that of the Grand Commander of the Order of the Defender of the Realm but has narrower stripes. The badge is worn around the neck, the badge for women has a ribbon which is tied in a bow. The badge suspends from the bow and is pinned to the chest, officer of the Order of the Defender of the Realm There is no limit to the number of persons to be awarded this honour. It can also be conferred on foreign citizens as an honorary award and it does not carry any title
40.
Professor
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Professor is an academic rank at universities and other post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, professor derives from Latin as a person who professes being usually an expert in arts or sciences, in much of the world, the unqualified word professor is used formally to indicate the highest academic rank, informally known as full professor. Professors conduct original research and commonly teach undergraduate, graduate, or professional courses in their fields of expertise, in universities with graduate schools, professors may mentor and supervise graduate students conducting research for a thesis or dissertation. Professors typically hold a Ph. D. another doctorate or a different terminal degree, some professors hold a masters degree or a professional degree, such as an M. D. as their highest degree. The term professor was first used in the late 14th century to one who teaches a branch of knowledge. As a title that is prefixed to a name, it dates from 1706, the hort form prof is recorded from 1838. The term professor is used with a different meaning, ne professing religion. This canting use of the word comes down from the Elizabethan period, a professor is an accomplished and recognized academic. In most Commonwealth nations, as well as northern Europe, the professor is the highest academic rank at a university. In the United States and Canada, the title of professor is also the highest rank, in these areas, professors are scholars with doctorate degrees or equivalent qualifications who teach in four-year colleges and universities. An emeritus professor is a given to selected retired professors with whom the university wishes to continue to be associated due to their stature. Emeritus professors do not receive a salary, but they are often given office or lab space, and use of libraries, labs, the term professor is also used in the titles assistant professor and associate professor, which are not considered professor-level positions in some European countries. In Australia, the associate professor is used in place of reader, ranking above senior lecturer. However, such professors usually do not undertake academic work for the granting institution, in general, the title of professor is strictly used for academic positions rather than for those holding it on honorary basis. Other roles of professorial tasks depend on the institution, its legacy, protocols, place, a professor typically earns a base salary and a range of benefits. In addition, a professor who undertakes additional roles in her institution earns additional income, some professors also earn additional income by moonlighting in other jobs, such as consulting, publishing academic or popular press books, or giving speeches or coaching executives. Some fields give professors more opportunities for outside work, the anticipated average earnings with performance-related bonuses for a German professor is €71,500. The salaries of civil servant professors in Spain are fixed in a basis, but there are some bonus related to performance and seniority
41.
Wayback Machine
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The Internet Archive launched the Wayback Machine in October 2001. It was set up by Brewster Kahle and Bruce Gilliat, and is maintained with content from Alexa Internet, the service enables users to see archived versions of web pages across time, which the archive calls a three dimensional index. Since 1996, the Wayback Machine has been archiving cached pages of websites onto its large cluster of Linux nodes and it revisits sites every few weeks or months and archives a new version. Sites can also be captured on the fly by visitors who enter the sites URL into a search box, the intent is to capture and archive content that otherwise would be lost whenever a site is changed or closed down. The overall vision of the machines creators is to archive the entire Internet, the name Wayback Machine was chosen as a reference to the WABAC machine, a time-traveling device used by the characters Mr. Peabody and Sherman in The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show, an animated cartoon. These crawlers also respect the robots exclusion standard for websites whose owners opt for them not to appear in search results or be cached, to overcome inconsistencies in partially cached websites, Archive-It. Information had been kept on digital tape for five years, with Kahle occasionally allowing researchers, when the archive reached its fifth anniversary, it was unveiled and opened to the public in a ceremony at the University of California, Berkeley. Snapshots usually become more than six months after they are archived or, in some cases, even later. The frequency of snapshots is variable, so not all tracked website updates are recorded, Sometimes there are intervals of several weeks or years between snapshots. After August 2008 sites had to be listed on the Open Directory in order to be included. As of 2009, the Wayback Machine contained approximately three petabytes of data and was growing at a rate of 100 terabytes each month, the growth rate reported in 2003 was 12 terabytes/month, the data is stored on PetaBox rack systems manufactured by Capricorn Technologies. In 2009, the Internet Archive migrated its customized storage architecture to Sun Open Storage, in 2011 a new, improved version of the Wayback Machine, with an updated interface and fresher index of archived content, was made available for public testing. The index driving the classic Wayback Machine only has a bit of material past 2008. In January 2013, the company announced a ground-breaking milestone of 240 billion URLs, in October 2013, the company announced the Save a Page feature which allows any Internet user to archive the contents of a URL. This became a threat of abuse by the service for hosting malicious binaries, as of December 2014, the Wayback Machine contained almost nine petabytes of data and was growing at a rate of about 20 terabytes each week. Between October 2013 and March 2015 the websites global Alexa rank changed from 162 to 208, in a 2009 case, Netbula, LLC v. Chordiant Software Inc. defendant Chordiant filed a motion to compel Netbula to disable the robots. Netbula objected to the motion on the ground that defendants were asking to alter Netbulas website, in an October 2004 case, Telewizja Polska USA, Inc. v. Echostar Satellite, No.02 C3293,65 Fed. 673, a litigant attempted to use the Wayback Machine archives as a source of admissible evidence, Telewizja Polska is the provider of TVP Polonia and EchoStar operates the Dish Network
42.
Monarchy of Thailand
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The monarchy of Thailand refers to the constitutional monarchy and monarch of the Kingdom of Thailand. The King of Thailand is the head of state and head of the ruling Royal House of Chakri, the institution was transformed into a constitutional monarchy in 1932 after the bloodless Siamese Revolution of 1932. The King of Thailands titles include Head of State, Head of the Royal Thai Armed Forces, Adherent of Buddhism, the current concept of Thai kingship evolved through 800 years of absolute rule. The first king of a unified Thailand was the founder of the Kingdom of Sukhothai, King Sri Indraditya, the idea of this early kingship is said to be based on two concepts derived from Hinduism and Theravada Buddhist beliefs. The first concept is based on the Vedic-Hindu caste of Kshatriya, or warrior-ruler, the second is based on the Theravada Buddhist concept of Dhammaraja, Buddhism having been introduced to Thailand around the 6th century CE. The idea of the Dhammaraja, is that the king should rule his people in accordance with Dharma and these ideas were briefly replaced in 1279, when King Ramkhamhaeng came to the throne. Ramkhamhaeng departed from tradition and created instead a concept of paternal rule and this idea is reinforced in the title and name of the king, as he is still known today, Pho Khun Ramkhamhaeng meaning Father Ruler Ramkhamhaeng. By the end of the kingdom, the two old concepts returned as symbolized by the change in the style of the kings, Pho was changed to Phaya or Lord. The Kingdom of Sukhothai was supplanted by the Kingdom of Ayutthaya, during the Ayutthayan period, the idea of kingship changed. Due to ancient Khmer tradition in the region, the Hindu concept of kingship was applied to the status of the leader, Brahmins took charge in the royal coronation. The king was treated as a reincarnation of Hindu gods, Ayutthaya historical documents show the official titles of the kings in great variation, Indra, Shiva and Vishnu, or Rama. Seemingly, Rama was the most popular, as in Ramathibodhi, however, Buddhist influence was also evident, as many times the kings title and unofficial name Dhammaraja, an abbreviation of the Buddhist Dharmaraja. The two former concepts were re-established, with a third, older concept taking hold and this concept was called Devaraja, which was an idea borrowed by the Khmer Empire from the Hindu-Buddhist kingdoms of Java, especially the idea of a scholar class based on Hindu Brahmins. The king, portrayed by state interests as a figure, then became—through a rigid cultural implementation—an object of worship. From then on the monarchy was largely removed from the people, living in palaces designed after Mount Meru, the kings turned themselves into a Chakravartin, where the king became an absolute and universal lord of his realm. Kings demanded that the universe be envisioned as resolving around them, for four centuries these kings ruled Ayutthaya, presiding over some of the greatest period of cultural, economic, and military growth in Thai History. Whereas feudalism developed in the European Middle Ages, Ayutthayan King Trailokanat instituted Sakdina and this comported with the names of two kingdoms further north, Lanna Million Fields and Sip Song Phan Na Twelve Thousand Fields. Rachasap is required by court etiquette as an honorific register consisting of a special vocabulary used exclusively for addressing the king, the king was chief administrator, chief legislator, and chief judge, with all laws, orders, verdict and punishments theoretically originating from his person
43.
Prajadhipok
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Prajadhipok, also Rama VII, was the seventh monarch of Siam of the House of Chakri. He was the last absolute monarch and the first constitutional monarch of the country and his reign was a turbulent time for Siam due to political and social changes during the Revolution of 1932. He is to date the only Siamese monarch of the Chakri Dynasty to abdicate, somdet Chaofa Prajadhipok Sakdidej was born on 8 November 1893 in Bangkok, Siam to King Chulalongkorn and Queen Saovabha Phongsri. Prince Prajadhipok was the youngest of nine born to the couple. Overall he was the kings second-youngest child, and the 33rd, unlikely to succeed to the throne, Prince Prajadhipok chose to pursue a military career. Like many of the children, he was sent abroad to study, going to Eton College in 1906. He received a commission in the Royal Horse Artillery in the British Army based in Aldershot, in 1910 Chulalongkorn died and was succeeded by Prajadhipoks older brother, Crown Prince Vajiravudh, who became King Rama VI. Prince Prajadhipok was by then commissioned in both the British Army and the Royal Siamese Army, once home, Prajadhipok became a high-ranking military official in Siam. In 1917 he was ordained temporarily as a monk, as was customary for most Buddhist Siamese men, in August 1918 Prince Prajadhipok married his childhood friend and cousin Mom Chao Rambhai Barni, a descendant of King Mongkut and his Royal Consort Piam. They were married at the Bang Pa-In Royal Palace with the blessing of the king, after the war in Europe ended, he attended the École Superieure de Guerre in France, returning to Siam to the Siamese military. During this time, he was granted the additional title Krom Luang Sukhothai, Prajadhipok lived a generally quiet life with his wife at their residence, Sukhothai Palace, next to the Chao Phraya River. Prajadhipok soon found himself rising rapidly in succession to the throne, in 1925, King Vajiravudh himself died at the age of 44. Prajadhipok became absolute monarch at only thirty-two and he was crowned King of Siam on 25 February 1926. The system of referring to Chakri rulers as Rama was instituted by King Vajiravudh to follow European practice, relatively unprepared for his new responsibilities, Prajadhipok was nevertheless intelligent, diplomatic in his dealings with others, modest, and eager to learn. However, he had inherited serious problems from his predecessor, the most urgent of these problems was the economy. The budget was heavily in deficit, and the financial accounts were a nightmare. The entire world was in the throes of the Great Depression, within half a year only three of Vajiravhuds twelve ministers still served the new king, the rest having been replaced by members of the royal family. While the family brought back men of talent and experience
44.
Ananda Mahidol
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Ananda Mahidol was the eighth monarch of Thailand from the House of Chakri as Rama VIII. At the time he was recognised as king by the National Assembly in March 1935 and he returned to Thailand in December 1945, but six months later in June 1946, he was found shot dead in his bed. Although at first thought to have been an accident, his death was ruled a murder by medical examiners, the mysterious circumstances surrounding his death have been the subject of much controversy. Ananda Mahidol is one word in Thai and is his given name, King Vajiravudh, his uncle, sent a telegram on 13 October 1925 giving him this name. It is pronounced Ananta Mahidon and means the joy of Mahidol, when he held his birth rank of mom chao—the lowest rank of Thai princes—he used the surname Mahidol, his fathers given name. His full name and title was thus, Mom Chao Ananda Mahidol Mahidol and his full royal name was Phra Bat Somdet Phra Poramenthra Maha Ananda Mahidol Phra Atthama Ramathibodindara, RTGS, —Ananthamahidon Phra Atthamaramathibodin), or Rama VIII. Prince Ananda Mahidol was born in Heidelberg, Germany and he was the first son of Prince Mahidol Adulyadej of Songkhla and Mom Sangwal who were studying there at the time. The family returned to Thailand in 1928 after Prince Mahidol finished his studies at Harvard University. Prince Mahidol died at age 37 in 1929, when Ananda Mahidol was just four years old and his widowed mother was thus left to raise her family alone. A coup détat in 1932 ended the monarchy and raised the possibility that King Prajadhipok might abdicate. Queen Savang Vadhana, his grandmother, was concerned about Prince Ananda Mahidols safety and it was then suggested that Mom Sangwal and her children return to Lausanne, and when they did so in 1933, the official reason given was for the health and further education of the princes. Prince Ananda Mahidol spent most of his youth in Switzerland, however, when King Prajadhipoks abdication appeared imminent, the princes mother was approached by a member of the government, asking for her opinion about Ananda Mahidol succeeding as monarch. See also King Prajadhipoks circumstance of succession King Prajadhipok abdicated in 1935 due to quarrels with the new quasi-democratic government as well as health problems. The king decided to abstain from exercising his prerogative to name a successor to the throne, a half-brother, Prince Vajiravudh replaced Prince Vajirunhis as the crown prince. He eventually succeeded to the throne in 1910 as King Rama VI, in 1924 the king instituted the Palace Law of Succession in order to govern subsequent successions. The law gave priority to the children of his mother Queen Regent Saovabha Phongsri over the children of King Chulalongkorns two other royal wives, the law was enacted on the death of King Vajiravudh in 1925 and the crown passed to his youngest brother, Prince Prajadhipok of Sukhothai. Offering the throne to Prince Prajadhipok was not without a debate and it was questioned whether the Succession Law enacted by King Vajiravudh actually barred Prince Chakrabongse Bhuvanath from succession on the grounds that he married a foreigner. However, his marriage had taken place before this law was enacted and had been endorsed by King Chulalongkorn himself, there was no clear resolution, but in the end the many candidates were passed over and Prince Prajadhipok was enthroned
45.
Bhumibol Adulyadej
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Bhumibol Adulyadej, conferred with the title King Bhumibol the Great in 1987, was the ninth monarch of Thailand from the Chakri dynasty as Rama IX. Having reigned since 9 June 1946, he was, at the time of his death, the worlds longest-serving head of state, during his reign, he was served by a total of 30 prime ministers beginning with Pridi Banomyong and ending with Prayut Chan-o-cha. Although Bhumibol did invite public criticism in a 2005 speech, the lèse majesté laws have not been revoked by the Thai parliament, in May 2014, Bhumibols wealth was once again listed as US$30 billion. After 2006, Bhumibol suffered declining health and spent extended periods at Siriraj Hospital and he was generally highly revered by the people in Thailand – many even saw him as close to divine. Notable political activists and Thai citizens who criticized the king or the institution of monarchy were often forced into exile or to suffer frequent imprisonments. His successor Vajiralongkorn does not share the popularity of his father, leading to concerns that the Thai monarchy will lose prestige and influence under the latters reign. Bhumibols U. S. birth certificate reads simply Baby Songkla, as the parents had to consult his uncle, King Rama VII, then head of the House of Chakri, for an auspicious name. The king chose a name of Sanskrit origin, Bhumibol Adulyadej, a compound of Bhūmi, meaning Land, Bala, meaning Strength or Power, Atulya, meaning Incomparable, and Tej, meaning Power. Thus, Bhūmibala Atulyateja, or Bhumibol Adulyadej as it is transliterated in Thai, literally means Strength of the Land, Bhumibol was born at Cambridge Hospital in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in the United States, on 5 December 1927. He was the youngest son of Prince Mahidol Adulyadej, the Prince of Songkla and his father was enrolled in the public health program at Harvard University, which is why Bhumibol was the only monarch to be born in the US. Bhumibol had a sister, Princess Galyani Vadhana, and an older brother. Bhumibol came to Thailand in 1928, after his father obtained a certificate from Harvard and his father died of kidney failure in September 1929, when Bhumibol was less than two years old. He briefly attended Mater Dei school in Bangkok, but in 1933 his mother took her family to Switzerland, in 1934 Bhumibol was given his first camera, which ignited his lifelong enthusiasm for photography. When Bhumibols childless uncle Prajadhipok abdicated in 1935, his nine-year-old brother Ananda became the new King Rama VIII, however, the family remained in Switzerland and the affairs of the head of state were conducted by a regency council. They returned to Thailand for only two months in 1938, in 1942, Bhumibol became a jazz enthusiast, and started to play the saxophone, a passion that he kept throughout his life. Bhumibol ascended the throne following the death by gunshot wound of his brother, King Ananda Mahidol, on 9 June 1946, while a first government statement stated that Ananda had accidentally shot himself, an investigation committee ruled this was virtually impossible. Two palace aides were convicted of regicide and executed. Bhumibol succeeded his brother, but returned to Switzerland before the end of the 100-day mourning period, despite his interest in science and technology, he changed his major and enrolled in law and political science to prepare for his duties as head of state
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Major General[1]
Malaysia : Honorary Grand Commander of the Order of the Defender of the Realm (1964)[6]:1
