First World, First Class
ZFT, I don't agree that it's 3rd world, except in mentality.
And conformance is conformance, so any country that complies with their obligations (1st, 2nd or 3rd world) deserves the top rating.
On the recertification there are two options: refuse to recertify or demote to category 2. And the criteria revolves around making substantial progress on deficiencies or actual correction of deficiencies.
Lots of LDC's (lesser-developed countries) make serious efforts to improve and upgrade their safety standards. That's a first world attitude operating under 3rd-world budgetary and expertise constraints.
Thai DCA/TG/AoT/AeroThai don't operate under 3rd-world budgetary constraints. There's plenty of cash to feed their bloated bureaucracies. Hard to pin them on the expertise side since they're self-certifying.
But they have a 3rd-world mentality of covering up their deficiencies with paper rather than actually doing anything about them. The new papers will be ignored just like the last batch. Rule number one, in a world where "saving face" is the priority: never admit you're wrong, and never point out that anyone else is either.
Leaving them in re-cert limbo is probably the only way to exert any pressure that can force changes. Decertifying only means that TG's slots into the US are frozen at current levels, and their monopoly of Thai carriers is extended. Everyone else goes on their merry way, the same same as Indonesia and the Phillipines, pumping effectively-unregulated, unsupervised tin into the skies over Asia. And of course, picking up all those freight and charter jobs at discount rates for the rest of the world.