Exiled Thai leader says he's short on money

Exiled former Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra said Thursday he was short on money, but that Thailand's move to freeze his assets may have helped safeguard his vast wealth from the financial crisis.

Thaksin shed light on his life in exile while speaking to news media in Hong Kong via video conference, saying his was currently in Dubai and had been offered passports from other countries he didn't identify.

The ousted leader, who's been spotted in far-flung locales from Hong Kong to Nicaragua since he left Thailand last year, said he had just enough money to support his travels and lifestyle.

He said he was eyeing a return to the telecommunications industry, where he made billions, but that he lacked sufficient funds to invest because much of his fortune remained locked up by the Thai government.

"I don't know whether I should condemn or thank the military junta that they've frozen my assets in Thailand," Thaksin, wearing a suit and speaking from a lectern dressed with a bouquet of red roses, told reporters at Hong Kong's Foreign Correspondents' Club. "Otherwise I probably would have invested a lot in the stock exchange and lost it."

But he added that he did not have much money outside of Thailand.

"I just have enough to finance my traveling and living standard," he said, joking that he needed "at least more than one dollar a day."

Thaksin's fortune was estimated at $2.2 billion in 2006 by Forbes Asia magazine. By 2008, his net worth was pegged at $400 million after Thai anti-graft investigators froze more than $1.8 billion of his family's assets pending the outcome of corruption cases against him.

It was a rare public appearance for the fallen leader, who has lived mostly in self-imposed exile since being ousted in a September 2006 military coup for alleged corruption and abuse of power. He fled Thailand in 2008 to avoid a two-year prison term for violating a conflict of interest law.

Thaksin canceled a live appearance at the Hong Kong club earlier this month after Thai authorities threatened to hunt down and extradite the exiled leader.

"A lot of friends who are leaders of several countries worry about me and have offered the passports of their countries ... to help protect me," he said. "But mostly I thanked them, and have not accepted their passports because I still believe in my citizenship, of being Thai."

His comments contradicted a previous statement that he had, in fact, accepted several offers.