Thai opposition urges PM to resign

Thailand's opposition leader Saturday refused to commit to elections mooted for July to end an ulcerous political crisis, instead calling for prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra to resign before new polls later in the year. The kingdom has been without a fully functioning government since December, severely hampering policy making and draining the energy of the nation's once-dynamic economy. Thailand has been bedevilled by an eight-year power struggle between a royalist establishment -- supported by parts of the judiciary and the military -- and the billionaire Shinawatra family, which has traditionally enjoyed strong support in poor, rural, northern portion of the country, according to AFP.