Thai king recovering after surgery

BANGKOK (Reuters) - Thailand's King Bhumibol Adulyadej, the world's longest-reigning monarch, was making a good recovery in hospital on Tuesday, the palace said, following surgery at the weekend to remove his gallbladder. A statement from the information division of His Majesty's Principle Private Secretary said the king's respiratory condition was good and his heart rate was close to normal, although he had experienced some fever and was receiving medication for pain near the site of the operation. The health of Bhumibol, 86, has formed the backdrop to a complex and unrelenting crisis being fought out between Thailand's rival business and political elites. Widely seen as a unifying figure and moral arbiter among Thais, the king's health is a subject of much public concern. Gallbladder removal is a common procedure, usually carried out to relieve painful gallstones. The statement, posted on the information division's Facebook page, said the removed organ had some inflammation but no abnormality was detected in the cells. The king left Bangkok's Siriraj Hospital last month after nearly five weeks of treatment for stomach inflammation. He was readmitted late on Friday for what the Royal Household Bureau said was a fever and irregular blood pressure. He spent nearly four years in a special suite of the hospital after being admitted in 2009 for a lung infection. Since then Bhumibol has rarely been seen aside from a few public events. He lives mostly at a seaside palace in Hua Hin, south of the capital. Bhumibol, the ninth king of the Chakri Dynasty, is a constitutional monarch who made several interventions in the 1970s and 1990s to call for calm during political crises. He stayed silent during the latest tumult, which began in November and culminated in a May 22 coup. Years of political strife, broadly pitting a Bangkok establishment backed by a coup-prone military against tycoons and politicians allied with former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, has centered partly around anxiety about royal succession. Bhumibol's son and presumed heir, Crown Prince Vajiralongkorn, does not command his father's popular support, but some Thaksin supporters expressed their loyalty to the prince during protests this year. (Reporting by Viparat Jantraprapaweth; Writing by Martin Petty; Editing by Raissa Kasolowsky)