Images show Thai ex-PM Thaksin in Dubai, not serving jail sentence at home in 2023

"Oops, I just found a leaked photo!" reads the Thai-language caption of a collage shared on Facebook here on August 31, 2023.

The images appear to show Thaksin in a kitchen playing with a child whose face had been blurred.

"So where is inmate Thaksin now? Is he staying at home with his grandchildren or lying in a hospital bed at the Police General Hospital? This is something that the Police General Hospital and Department of Corrections have to answer."

Thaksin was immediately jailed on his return to Thailand on August 22 with the kingdom's Supreme Court ordering him to serve eight years on old graft and abuse of power charges.

He was transferred within hours to a private room at a police hospital because of his reportedly poor health. The Department of Corrections said it could not disclose further details about Thaksin's health.

On September 1 the king cut his sentence to one year.

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Screenshot of the false Facebook post, captured on September 25, 2023

Speculation has raged in Thailand of a backroom deal to grant Thaksin leniency on his sentence, fuelled by the fact he returned on the same day his Pheu Thai party came to power in coalition with pro-military parties.

His family is thinking about seeking parole for the 74-year-old, who had undergone surgery while in hospital according to his daughter.

The same collage was also shared in similar posts on Facebook here, here, here and here.

Comments on the posts suggest many users believed Thaksin was at home rather than in police custody.

"I knew it! It was a plan for Thaksin to end up like this, otherwise he wouldn't dare come back," read one comment.

"This guy is truly above the law," another user said.

But the images were taken from a video posted online in April 2022 -- over a year before Thaksin returned to Thailand.

Dubai video

A keyword search on social media platforms led to a video of Thaksin with his granddaughter, which was shared on the Instagram account of Thaksin's youngest daughter Paetongtarn Shinawatra here on April 10, 2022 (archived link).

"The grandpa is very fit. His grandchild is 10 kilograms, but he carries her up and down and stood up very fast," reads part of the Thai-language caption.

Below is a screenshot comparison between the collage in the false posts (left) and the video shared on Paetongtarn's Instagram account (right):

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Photo collage in the false posts (left) and video shared on Paetongtarn's Instagram (right)

A review of Paetongtarn's other Instagram posts at the time found she was visiting Thaksin in Dubai, where he has spent most of his time in exile to avoid criminal charges he long maintained were politically motivated.

Paetongtarn shared photos of her arrival in the Middle Eastern city on April 9, 2022 -- a day before she posted the video (archived link).

Thai media reported the visit here and here, noting Pheu Thai party members had also flown to Dubai to celebrate Songkran -- Thailand's New Year -- with Thaksin and his sister Yingluck Shinawatra, also a former prime minister (archived links here and here).

The same video was also shared on April 17, 2022 here on a TikTok account called "yingluck.fc", which is dedicated to content related to Yingluck (archived link).