Hot News
Thailand hot news, breaking stories, crime, politics, tourism, and business—stay updated with in-depth reports and exclusive interviews on the latest events across the country. Get the latest from The Thaiger, your trusted Thailand news source.
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Sponsored Do foreigners get free healthcare in Thailand?
Thailand’s healthcare system is well-regarded across Southeast Asia, with options ranging from public hospitals to world-class private facilities. But when it comes to foreign residents or tourists, healthcare access isn’t as straightforward. So, do foreigners get free healthcare in Thailand?...
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Police arrest 3 suspects allegedly involved in major drug smuggling operation
Police arrested 3 people on drug charges and seized more than 2 million methamphetamine pills in busts in Saraburi and Phetchabun. The suspects were allegedly involved in a major illegal drug operation related to major cases in Bangkok and allegedly smuggled drugs from Laos to the border province Loei. Police say another suspect is on the run. The suspects allegedly…
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Police chief transferred after protesters rally at police station, hang banner calling for monarchy reform
A district police chief was abruptly transferred from his post after pro-democracy protesters staged a rally and hung banners at a police station in the Isaan province Chaiyaphum. Protesters called for monarchy reform in Thailand and democracy in Myanmar following the military coup. Protesters from the People’s Group, also known as Ratsadon, marched from a local school to the police…
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TAT’s new tourism strategy is “SEXY”
“SEXY” is the name of the Tourism Authority of Thailand’s new recovery strategy to move forward after the Covid-19 pandemic. While it sounds provocative, there are no hot deals on strip clubs or go go bars… there’s really nothing sexy about the travel concept. The strategy focuses on implementing public health safety practices, promoting environmental sustainability such as wildlife conservation…
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BTS gives city officials an ultimatum: Pay its debt or Skytrain’s Green Line will shut down
The Bangkok Mass Transit System is giving city officials an ultimatum: Pay off its more than 30 billion baht debt or the Skytrain’s Green Line will shut down. They are giving the Bangkok Metropolitan Administration 60 days to get its finances in order. The administration owes more than 9.6 billion baht in wages related to operating the Green Line, adding up…
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Singapore Airlines to offer flights to Phuket next month
Singapore Airlines plans to offer flights to Phuket starting on March 4. Singapore-Phuket flights operated on the B737-800 aircraft which have 12 business class seats and 150 economy class seats. The new route follows a merger with the airline’s subsidiarity Silk Air. The Silk Air routes will progressively be transferred and 9 Boeing 737-800 NG aircraft will be reassigned to…
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Railway union rejects plans to close the Hua Lamphong Station which is set to be closed in November
Trains, planes and buses in Thailand all have restricted travel at the moment. In the case of the flights, domestic carriers have been forced to cancel or reschedule hundreds of flights due to the high drop off of passenger traffic since the start of Thailand’s second wave of Covid-19 which kicked off on December 20 last year. But amidst the…
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Lights, camera, Covid – Tourism Ministry wants film crews to come to Thailand now
Without much luck with their ‘cunning ideas’ to draw back a few of the remaining world’s travellers, Thailand’s tourism officials are turning to the film industry to attract some people and investment. The Tourism and Sports Ministry is aiming to generate around 3 billion baht from foreign film crews and is targeting film projects with an investment over 100 million baht.…
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Pattaya Beach, fly over the pristine but horrifyingly empty beaches | VIDEO
The Thailand Discovery YouTube channel has captured an empty Pattaya beach front for the first month of 2021. The first month of any year would usually be one of the busiest months of the year and the beaches should be heaving with tourists in the post Christmas/New Year break and the lead up to the Chinese New Year travel burst.…
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Road sweeper finds an unexploded shell on Chon Buri highway
A 56 year old road sweeper did more than just clean a Chon Buri highway yesterday, he cleared the road completely. The man found a large piece of explosive ordnance on the main city motorway yesterday afternoon. Chon Buri city police were notified of the 45 centimetre long ‘shell’ found on the side of the road on the main motorway. The…
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3 arrested over January 16 ping pong bomb attack in Bangkok
3 men have been arrested in over a bomb attack that injured 5 people who were part of a a pro-democracy demonstration near Chulalongkorn University earlier this month. The 5 people injured included 3 police and 2 protesters. The injuries were only minor. The arrested men are 23 year old Pornchai Prakapuang, 30 year old Weerayut Sumritruangsri and 19 year…
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Taxi and transport drivers calling for help from the Thai government
Unions of Thai Taxi workers and Thai automobile drivers have handed over an official request to a government labour committee to file a request to the government seeking financial support. Thai Taxi workers passed over their requests to Suthep Yoo-on, the chairman of the Labour Committee officially seeking industry support. Just about all sectors of the country’s transport infrastructure have…
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600 factories ordered to monitor emissions to help reduce air pollution
To reduce air pollution, hundreds of factories across Thailand are ordered to monitor their emissions. Air quality in Bangkok has reached unhealthy to even hazardous levels in recent weeks due to the excessive levels of the ultra-fine dust PM2.5, according to IQ Air. Under the new regulations set by the Industry Ministry, factories that are most likely to emit PM2.5…
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Taxis and tuk tuks ask Thai government for help
Unions of Thai Taxi workers and Thai automobile drivers have handed over an official request to a government labour committee to file a request to the government seeking financial support. Thai Taxi workers passed over their requests to Suthep Yoo-on, the chairman of the Labour Committee officially seeking industry support. Just about all sectors of the country’s transport infrastructure have…
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Man killed and 2 injured after sports car collides with van in Bangkok
A man was killed and 2 others were injured in a traffic accident last night in Bangkok’s Nong Khaem district. Thai media says 35 year old Natthawat was driving a “souped up” Nissan Skyline when he lost control of the sports car, driving over the median and colliding with an oncoming van. Police responding to the accident on Petchkasem Road…
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Methamphetamine worth 51 million baht found washed up on Koh Samui beach
Packages of crystal methamphetamine worth around 51 million baht were found washed up on Koh Samui’s Hat Koh Taen beach yesterday. Police suspect the drugs are from a vessel which sank off the coast of Vietnam while carrying a large shipment of drugs. Police say 100 kilograms of methamphetamine was found on the coast of Vietnam on December 10. Just…
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Around 9,000 people to face charges for allegedly defrauding travel subsidy scheme
Around 9,000 people will face criminal charges for allegedly defrauding the “We Travel Together” subsidy scheme which was launched to stimulate the economy and to help hotels and restaurants that were struggling after the lack of travel due to the coronavirus pandemic. The national police chief Suwat Jangyodsuk says the police plan to prosecute around 9,000 people for conspiring with…
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Hotels and restaurants raided, 50 arrested for allegedly cheating “We Travel Together” subsidy scheme
Several hotels and restaurants in Phuket and Chaiyaphum were raided this morning and 50 people were arrested for allegedly stealing from the government subsidy scheme “We Travel Together.” The scheme was launched to help businesses that were financially hit by the lack of tourists during the Covid-19 pandemic and to stimulate the battered economy. Last month, the Tourism Authority of…
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Owners of vehicles emitting black smoke to be fined up to 5,000 baht
Owners of cars and trucks emitting an excessive amount of black smoke face a fine up to 5,000 baht. The heavy fine is an attempt to reduce air pollution in Bangkok. Along with the fine, the Department of Land Transport will also order the vehicle be suspended from use until its emission system is fixed. According to the department, from…
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Florida is ready to host Olympics if Tokyo draws back
If Tokyo backs out of hosting the Olympics, Florida might step in. The 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo was postponed due to the Covid-19 pandemic and rescheduled for this July. With a fairly unpredictable future, Tokyo could back out of its plan to host the Olympics. Florida’s chief financial officer says the Sunshine State is ready. The CFO, Jimmy Patronis,…
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16 Thai Navy officials investigated for alleged involvement in drug trafficking
The Royal Thai Navy is investigating 16 of its officials for alleged involvement in a drug trafficking operation earlier this month in the Isaan province Nong Khai which borders Laos. If the officials are found guilty, the Navy will immediately take both disciplinary and legal action, according to a spokesperson. Local officials reportedly seized 2 million amphetamine tablets and 116…
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Police in Bangkok arrest 3 people for allegedly selling cannabis cookies
Police in Bangkok arrested 3 people for allegedly making cannabis cookies and selling them through the messaging application LINE under a chat group called “The Hippy Cookie.” Police raided a condominium room in the Bang Na district and seized 13 “foreign types” of cannabis, 46 food products made with cannabis and 3 types of hallucinogenic mushrooms. Using the LINE messaging…
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Thai police arrest 3 people for allegedly tricking women into prostitution work overseas
Police arrested 3 people for allegedly recruiting Thai women to work overseas in the United Arab Emirates where they were forced into prostitution. The suspects allegedly told the women that they would work as masseuses, promising of good pay and assuring them that the work did not involve sex, according to the Department of Special Investigations deputy director general Supat…
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Stop the burn – Thai Governors told to stop farmers burning off agricultural waste
Provincial governors in Thailand’s farming areas are being told to mitigate the burning off of agri-business waste by farmers in their provinces. The annual burn-offs are the biggest cause of the December to April air pollution in Bangkok and Central Thailand which lie in the wake of the light north-easterly breezes this time of the year. The burn-offs partly co-incide with the lighter…
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34.7% of Thai tourist businesses closed down
“When the tourists start coming back it will be a very different holiday experience for them. Will it ever get back to the numbers before Covid? Never.” A Tourism Authority of Thailand survey, conducted between January 10 – 12, indicates that more than a third of the country’s tourism-related businesses has already shut up shop and gone out of business.…
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Asia’s biggest drug kingpin arrested in Netherlands
Asia’s biggest drug kingpin is under arrest in the Netherlands after years of authorities chasing him worldwide. 57 year old Tse Chi Lop, a Chinese-born Canadian citizen, was arrested by Dutch police acting on a request by Australia’s federal police. The UN Office on Drugs and Crime named him as the suspected leader of the Asian mega-cartel known as “Sam…
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2 shot dead at Phuket Bus Terminal Saturday night
Police say 2 men were gunned down at the Phuket Bus Terminal by a colleague at the terminal along the stretch of Thepkasattri road heading into Phuket Town last night. The incident happened at about 10:15pm with the local police chief arriving along with medical staff from Vachira Hospital shortly after the incident. 60 year old Wian Iadchuthong, the alleged…
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29 arrested in Pattaya for smoking shisha above Indian restaurant
Police are investigating an Indian restaurant where they arrested 29 people for a late night party in Pattaya’s Soi 7. The incident took place at 12:30am at a 5 story building which had the first 3 floors closed. Police say the venue was actually operating as a shisha lounge, pool hall, and bar. The raid was based on a tip…
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Phuket lifts mandatory quarantine restrictions for ‘high risk’ arrivals. But were they ever applied?
Culminating 2 weeks of mass confusion over the apparent mandatory self-quarantine for arrivals to Phuket from Bangkok and other high risk provinces, Phuket’s provincial communicable disease committee has agreed to lift the mandatory 14 day quarantine “to help boost the local economy hit by the Covid-19 pandemic”. But for the vast majority of arrivals from Bangkok (DMK and BKK) to…
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Border districts screening cars for smuggling illegal migrants
Security officers in Thailand’s 3 border districts are under strict orders to screen all cars at security checkpoints for illegal migrant smuggling. The orders come after the arrests of 3 Thais who allegedly smuggled illegal migrants into the country using their own cars, with all cases being linked to each other. The smugglers tried to escape being detected by authorities…
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Phuket wants Bangkok arrivals to skip quarantine to help tourism revenue
Phuket’s tourism representatives are calling for an end to the mandatory quarantine levied at tourists arriving to the province from Bangkok. The tourism delegation have also told Phuket’s provincial government to be prepared to start receiving international tourists starting in October. According to The Phuket News, such a plan would include a requirement for all international travellers to Thailand to…
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