Profile: Thaksin Shinawatra

Thaksin has been convicted of corruption, but protests his innocence

Thaksin Shinawatra is one of the most influential - and polarising - characters in Thai politics.

But for a while, at least, it seems he will not be going home.

A telecommunications billionaire, he was the first prime minister in Thailand's history to lead an elected government through a full term in office.

But after more than five years in power, he was ousted in a military coup in September 2006, accused of corruption and abuse of power.

Thaksin went to the UK and bought Manchester City football club.

When his allies won the first post-coup elections in late 2007, he returned to Thailand. There he and his family faced a raft of corruption charges - allegations which the former Thai leader probably expected to come to nothing.

But in July 2008 his wife Pojaman was sentenced to three years in jail for tax fraud, and now the Supreme Court has found Thaksin himself guilty of a corruption charge, sentencing him to two years' imprisonment.

The couple is in self-imposed exile in the UK, and say they plan to stay there indefinitely.

A "continuation of dictatorship" in Thai politics has led to "interference in the justice system", Thaksin has alleged.

Former policeman

Born in 1949 in the northern city of Chiang Mai, Thaksin started his career as a police officer.

In 1973, he received a government scholarship to study for a masters degree in criminal justice in the United States.

When he returned he went into business and during the late 1980s began building a successful telecommunications empire.

He founded the Thai Rak Thai (Thais Love Thais) party in 1998, and its rapid emergence transformed Thai politics.

Thaksin swept into office in 2001, soundly defeating the old guard from the Democrat Party.

Poorer voters liked his offers of cheap medical care and debt relief, his nationalist platform and his contempt for the "Bangkok elite".

The military took power while Thaksin was at the UN in New York

But big business also liked him for his CEO style of government and his "Thaksinomics" policies which created a new boom in the country where the Asian financial crisis of the late 1990s began.

Thaksin also won support for his handling of the tsunami relief effort after the 2004 Indian Ocean disaster, which devastated parts of south-western Thailand.

Other things were not so easy. He had to face the fallout from his government's suppression of news of an outbreak of bird flu, as well as criticism over the violent deaths of more than 2,500 people during a crackdown on drugs in 2003.

Thailand's Corruption Commission found he had failed to declare all of his wealth, and he was also criticised over the government's handling of the upsurge in violence in the largely Muslim south.

Yet each time he faced pressure, Thaksin appeared to ride out the storm, his backing among his key supporters - Thailand's rural voters - apparently unscathed.

Political turmoil

It was his family's decision to sell its shares in one of Thailand's biggest telecom groups, Shin Corp, that led to Thaksin's downfall.

The early 2006 sale, which netted his family and friends $1.9bn, angered many urban Thais, who complained that the Thaksin family had avoided paying tax and passed control of an important national asset to Singaporean investors.

Amid large-scale street demonstrations, Thaksin called a snap general election for April 2006, effectively telling opponents to "put up or shut up".

But main opposition parties boycotted the polls and many voters chose to register a "no vote".

Faced with the threat of further protests, Thaksin said he would step down. He did for a few weeks, but returned to office in May.

In September, following months of political uncertainty, the military seized power while the prime minister was out of the country.

Thaksin relocated to the UK, where he invested in the premier league football club, Manchester City. But his popularity among Thailand's rural poor remained sky-high.

In the first post-coup polls, his allies won by far the most votes and formed a coalition government - paving the way for his return home.

This came in February 2008. Thaksin swore he had no wish to return to front-line politics, but his opponents did not believe him.

The courts - greatly empowered by a new military-backed constitution - pursued the cases against him and his family with new vigour.

Like his wife, Thaksin has now been sentenced to jail, so he is unlikely to want to return to Thailand any time soon.