Betrayal best served cold, and with mint-choc, in Thai politics

A cup of ‘treachery’: A barista preparing an iced chocolate mint drink named Betrayal at ThinkLab Cafe, next to Pheu Thai Party headquarters, in Bangkok. — AFP

BETRAYAL is a beverage best served chilled in Thailand, as an innocuous chocolate-mint iced concoction takes the limelight – an unlikely symbol of the kingdom’s deep political divisions following May’s election.

The country is deadlocked after the Move Forward Party (MFP), buoyed to victory by promises to end nearly a decade of army-backed rule, failed to get its reformist candidate elected prime minister, forcing it to bow out and allow coalition partner Pheu Thai to try to form a government.