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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Hampshire family launches urgent appeal to bring father home after Thailand bike crash
A grief-stricken family from Hampshire is trying to get the body of their father back home after learning he died in a motorcycle accident in Thailand. Anthony Murphy lay dead in a hospital morgue for five days before he officials discovered his real name. At the time he was registered as John Doe, a name used when the true name…
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Tourism council predicts 30 million foreign tourists in Thailand this year
Thailand’s tourist numbers have certainly picked up lately and some groups are very optimistic about numbers this year. The Tourism Industry Council of Thailand predicts that over 30 million foreign tourists will travel to Thailand in 2023, bringing 3 trillion baht to Thailand’s economy. The number of international tourists in Thailand before the Covid-19 pandemic was 40 million in 2019. …
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‘Unruly’ Italian passenger tied to her seat on Vistara flight
Vistara cabin crew tied an ‘unruly’ Italian passenger to her seat after she allegedly became violent on a flight from Abu Dhabi to Mumbai in India on Monday. Airline staff alleged in a police complaint that 45 year old Paola Perruccio of Italian nationality assaulted a member of the cabin crew and spat on another mid-air. The complaint alleges that…
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Sea nomads win land encroachment case in South Thailand
Sea nomads have won a land encroachment case in South Thailand after a month-long legal battle. The dispute was over a fence blocking access to a school on the island of Koh Lipe. The Ban Koh Adang school is located in a community populated by Thailand’s Moken minority group. The moken are a semi-nomadic Austronesian group that lives in Thai…
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Qatar Airways launches thrice daily flights to Phuket
Qatari flag carrier Qatar Airways is launching three flights per day between Doha and Phuket in southern Thailand starting today, February 1, to meet the ever-growing demand. The additional flights bring the airline’s number of services to Thailand up to seven per day, including four flights to and from Bangkok. Doha is a major Middle Eastern transport hub and most…
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American man dies after crashing Ducati into trailer truck
Tragedy struck in the southern province of Phang Nga yesterday when an American man died after crashing his Ducati motorcycle into a trailer truck at 5.30pm on Phetchakasem Road. Officers from Mueng Phan Nga Police Station investigated the scene of the accident and found the body of the foreign man on the road at the back of the trailer truck.…
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Thailand tourist fee: 300 baht via air, 150 baht via land/sea
Thailand plans to charge foreign arrivals arriving by air a tourist fee of 300 baht (US$9.11) and a fee of 150 baht (US$4.56) for tourists entering the kingdom via land/sea by mid-2023. The 300 baht tourist fee for air arrivals has been in the pipeline for a long time and is set to be enforced in June after facing several Covid-19-related…
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Activists pressure opposition to do away with royal defamation law
Thai activists are pressuring the opposition Pheu Thai Party to do away with the royal defamation law if elected to office this year. The requests come at a time when three demonstrators are seriously ill after going on a hunger strike over the royal defamation law. Two of the activists are currently in the hospital and listed in serious condition. Pheu…
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Crazy Russian bites off British woman’s finger in Ko Pha Ngan bean bag row
A leisurely stroll on a Thai beach with two friends and a dog bizarrely evolved into a scene from a horror movie after a crazy Russian woman went berserk, chomped on a British woman’s finger and spat it out. The British woman was walking her dog with a German friend on a beach on Ko Pha Ngan Island when they…
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Grab Thailand reveals foreign tourist trends
Grab Thailand saw a 45% increase in foreign users between Q2 and Q3 in 2022, suggesting a positive outlook for the recovery of the tourism industry. The top five countries foreign Grab users came from are… Indonesia Malaysia Singapore United States Vietnam To meet the needs of foreign users, the ride-hailing super-app focussed on perfecting three key aspects of service:…
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Failed Phuket construction projects trigger corruption investigation
A number of failed Phuket construction projects have triggered a corruption investigation after being called into question by the STRONG Anti-Corruption Thailand Club. The Phuket government information office has shared posts online by the group that detail projects that were meant to be completed years ago, despite millions of baht being spent on them. According to The Phuket News, one…
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Dusit Thani College lifts its service and tourism job fair to ASEAN level
Press Release It had been an annual practice for Dusit Thani College, a specialized educational institute in hotel management, tourism, and culinary arts under Dusit International, to organize Hospitality Career Day to give opportunities in hospitality industry to the college’s students before expanding the event into a national level last year. The fair, newly named Hospitality Talent Fair, attracted those…
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Ukraine MP kicked out of parliament after visiting Thailand in unapproved trip
A lawmaker in Ukraine is now without his job after posting a video of him on an unapproved holiday in Thailand. Mykola Tyshchenko posted a video of him splashing around in the ocean on Facebook while saying that he was on an approved business trip in Asia. According to the Pattaya Mail, he furthered his intentions for some fun in…
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Chinese tourists wrongly fined 60,000 baht for carrying vapes, says law expert
A group of Thai tour guides revealed that a group of Chinese tourists were fined 60,000 baht for carrying vapes in Pattaya. The police also gave a 50% discount and let the tourists pay only 30,000 baht. According to Thai law, Thai police cannot arrest or fine foreigners with vapes. They have to report the issue to the court. The…
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Bangkok public bus condemned by Singaporean tourist
A Singaporean tourist condemned Bangkok Mass Transit Authority (BMTA) public buses after the driver of a bus in the capital closed its door and drove off as she was about to climb onboard. A Singaporean woman posted a video on her TikTok account, njwah, complaining about the service of a public bus in Bangkok. She wrote captions in Thai and…
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Koh Samui booms as over 200,000 tourists visit the popular island in January
The picturesque island of Koh Samui in Surat Thani province, Thailand, has seen a remarkable turnaround to its economy in the first month of 2023 with over 200,000 tourists visiting in January alone. After a year of uncertainty due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the arrival of over 200,000 tourists has been a welcome sight for the island’s local economy. The…
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Royalist accuses 14 year old girl of royal defamation in Thailand
Thai police summoned a 14 year old girl to a police station for questioning after an ultra-royalist accused her of royal defamation, according to Thai Lawyers for Human Rights. She is the youngest person ever to be charged with royal defamation, also called lèse-majesté. Arnon Klinkaew, a core member of an ultra-royalist group, accused the child of violating Section 112…
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Three foreign tourists rescued from Thai jungle
National park officials rescued three foreign tourists who got lost in the jungle in Koh Pha Ngan, Surat Thani province, southern Thailand, yesterday. All three are reportedly safe. At 5.30pm, the Chief of Than Sadet National Park, Tikamporn Phenchom, received a call that three foreign tourists were lost in the jungle on the Khao Ra mountain and needed help. Chief…
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Government of Thailand give green light for Eastern Aviation City takeoff
Construction on the Eastern Aviation City is ready for takeoff this year after the Government of Thailand gave the green light for work to start on the 290 billion baht (US$8.8bn) project. No official date has been confirmed but work is scheduled to start before June. The original project was officially signed in June 2020. An agreement was made between…
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Google tapped as Election Commission denies helping PM
The Office of the Election Commission (EC) reached out to Google Thailand for support in the upcoming General Election, while they deny accusations of favouring Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha. They asked the search engine tech giant to help raise awareness about the election and assist in cracking down on fake news. On Monday, EC Secretary-General Sawaeng Boonmee met with a…
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Election billboards for Anutin may be illegal
The Rural Doctor Society raised concerns over the possible violation of election laws by 11,000 roadside billboards featuring Deputy Prime Minister and Public Health Minister Anutin Charnvirakul. The society posted on its Facebook page calling on the Election Commission (EC) to investigate the matter. The billboards are located outside provincial, district, subdistrict and community-level hospitals under the care of the…
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Pirate ship restaurant capsizes in Pattaya
A pirate-ship-themed bar and restaurant capsized off the coast of Pattaya in eastern Thailand yesterday. Luckily, the restaurant was not open for business due to bad weather. At 4.30pm, the Sawang Boriboon Rescue Foundation was informed that the “Krakenian Private of Pattaya” was floating down the coast of Pattaya Beach from Bali Hai Pier, not far from Central Pattaya, slowly…
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Drug law amendment makes 2 meth pills dealing
To effectively combat the illegal drug trade, a law is being amended in Thailand so that anyone caught in possession of more than one meth pill will now be considered a drug dealer. Minister of Public Health Anutin Charnvirakul announced this change yesterday, stating that the current regulation has been exploited by those who actually intend to sell the drugs.…
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American fitness YouTuber found dead in Pattaya
American fitness YouTuber Leo and Longevity was found dead at a house in Pattaya, eastern Thailand, last night. Officers from Pattaya City Police Station were called to a house in Pattaya Lagoon Village in Bang Lamung district at 8pm, where they found the body of 34 year old Laith Abdullah Algaz – also known as Leo Rex – in the…
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Remorseful husband says wife can burn ‘penis’ with ‘hot iron’ if she catches him gambling again
A remorseful husband said his wife could burn his “penis” with a “hot iron” if she catches him gambling again. The wife of the apologetic hubby, from the central province of Samut Prakarn, shared pictures and a video of her husband tied up on social media to shame him for his online gambling addiction. Local news page Khon Khao Ton…
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Bail applications denied for detained protestors
Bail applications by ten detainees have been denied because most of them were charged with serious offences during protests last year, ranging from possession of explosives and arson to inciting unrest. Protesters gathered in front of the Criminal Court on Sunday morning, where a man who had been there for several days collapsed and died. According to Thai PBS World,…
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United States launches SERVIR-Southeast Asia, a USAID-NASA initiative to fight climate change
Press Release Chonburi, 24 January 2023 : The U.S. Ambassador to Thailand Robert F. Godec and Dr. Karen M. St. Germain, Earth Science Division Director at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), launched the SERVIR-Southeast Asia program – a collaboration between the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and NASA – to help communities across Southeast Asia adapt…
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Truck smoke targeted over PM2.5 pollution
The Pollution Control Department (PCD) announced that they are ramping up efforts to control fine dust pollution in Bangkok and surrounding areas by increasing their scrutiny of public transport vehicles and trucks emitting smoke. The PCD Director-General Athapol Charoenshunsa stated that worsening PM2.5 pollution levels in the capital and its surroundings are partly caused by public transport vehicles that run…
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Thailand’s ‘new’ Airbus A350 spotted with Thai Airways livery
Thailand’s “new” Airbus A350 was spotted with Thai Airways livery last week in France. At the end of October, Thai Airways announced an agreement to lease two Airbus A350-900s to enter service this month. We’re almost in February, and while it doesn’t appear that the aircraft will be in service on schedule, plans are being made, albeit a bit late.…
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Teenage tennis prodigy who killed biker in BMW quits national team
A teenage tennis prodigy, who was involved in a fatal car accident at the age of 16, has resigned from the national team following a backlash from the public over his promotion to the Lawn Tennis Association of Thailand (LTAT) squad. The unnamed 16 year old boy crashed his BMW car into a red motorcycle at the intersection near Suranaree…
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