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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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  • Thai Airways’ pilot under investigation for botched landing at Frankfurt

    Thai Airways’ pilot under investigation for botched landing at Frankfurt

    A Thai Airways International pilot, flying for Thailand’s national flag carrier, is currently being investigated by Germany’s BFU (Bundesstelle für Flugunfalluntersuchung), the country’s civil aviation investigators, for flying a Thai Airways plane below the standard altitude as the flight he was piloting, was approaching Frankfurt International Airport. The flight had originated in Phuket. The incident has been related through the…

  • Former head of the National Office of Buddhism has assets valued at nearly 600 million baht

    Former head of the National Office of Buddhism has assets valued at nearly 600 million baht

    Nice work if you can get it. Except you’re working for the National Office of Buddhism. Now the former director of the National Office of Buddhism, Nopparat Benjawattananant, has been pointed out by the National Anti-Corruption Commission for being “unusually wealthy”, having “suspiciously” amassed assets worth about 575 million baht during his four year tenure. NACC secretary-general Worawit Sukboon says that…

  • British and Thai man arrested for flogging fake watches online

    British and Thai man arrested for flogging fake watches online

    A British and a Thai man are in custody after a sting operation in Pattaya caught them selling counterfeit brand name watches online to foreign buyers at a huge markup. Police identified them as 43 year old Mark Peter Dorey and 45 year old Virut Bua-raem. After a tipoff, an officer pretended to be a buyer and contacted Dorey. He…

  • Police track down “the great Bangkok pantie snatcher”

    Police track down “the great Bangkok pantie snatcher”

    One man’s been busy moving around Bangkok condos and apartments in the northern suburbs and ‘sampling’ a range of women’s underwear and lingerie. But police have curtailed his part-time activities and arrested a 55 year old and charged him with stealing more than 1400 pieces of women’s underwear. He was arrested at a condominium in Bangkok’s Don Muang District, according…

  • Police shoot knife-wielding attacker in Phuket Town

    Police shoot knife-wielding attacker in Phuket Town

    A police officer has shot dead a robber in Phuket Town early yesterday (Wednesday). The knife-wielding robber, 34 year old Aekkasit Kesorn, from Nakhorn Sri Thammarat, had attacked the officer whilst being interrupted in the middle of a robbery. The policeman ended up with a knife wound to the neck. The officer pulled out his firearm and shot the attacker…

  • Pattaya police investigate a man’s shooting death, the day after his birthday

    Pattaya police investigate a man’s shooting death, the day after his birthday

    A man in Pattaya has died after being shot. The 32 year old Thai man was found with a gunshot wound to the head. Police were notified of the incident yesterday at about 6:30am and are investigating to determine whether it was suicide or homicide. Police and emergency responders arrived at the scene on a rural road to find 32…

  • Mother and baby killed in Nakhon Si Thammarat intersection

    Mother and baby killed in Nakhon Si Thammarat intersection

    A mother and her 19 month old son have been killed after their motorcycle was struck by a car in a collision in Nakhon Si Thammarat, southern Thailand. The incident occurred at a three-way junction on Therdphrakiat road in the main city district this morning around 8am, according to police. The 38 year old motorcycle rider, Supanrat Srisawang, was making a right…

  • Man in custody after allegedly throwing grenade into Bangkok apartment

    Man in custody after allegedly throwing grenade into Bangkok apartment

    A lovesick Lat Phrao man is currently being questioned by police after allegedly throwing a suspected grenade into the apartment of the 20 year old girl he had fallen in love with. The incident happened at a Lat Phrao district apartment in northern Bangkok on Monday evening. Lat Phrao police and officers from Explosive Ordnance Disposal headed to the apartment…

  • Russian tourist in coma after Patong hotel balcony fall

    Russian tourist in coma after Patong hotel balcony fall

    A Russian tourist remains unconscious in hospital after falling four floors from the balcony of his Patong hotel. Police say the man, Daniil Solovev, is in “a serious but stable condition”. Police were called to the accommodation on Nanai Road hotel at 11am on Sunday morning. By the time they arrived, Solovev had already been rushed to hospital. Emergency responders say…

  • Dramatic video shows high speed impact, eight British tourists injured on their way to Pattaya – VIDEO

    Dramatic video shows high speed impact, eight British tourists injured on their way to Pattaya – VIDEO

    Dramatic highway CCTV has now been released of the crash of the passenger van, injuring eight British tourists travelling from Suvarnabhumi Airport to Pattaya. Three were seriously injured in the high speed crash which scattered contents of the van over the road and grassed verge between the two sides of the motorway. Eight British tourists are in hospital after their…

  • Eight British tourists injured in Thai passenger van crash – VIDEO

    Eight British tourists injured in Thai passenger van crash – VIDEO

    Eight British tourists are in hospital, three seriously injured, after their passenger van crashed into the median railing on the Bangkok-Chon Buri motorway. The incident occurred about 10:30am on the Pattaya-bound side of the road. The driver, 53 year old Thanakorn To-iam, said he picked up the passengers at Suvarnabhumi Airport in Bangkok and was taking them to Pattaya when…

  • Taiwanese husband arrested over death of Sri Racha woman in a suitcase

    Taiwanese husband arrested over death of Sri Racha woman in a suitcase

    Just days after the body of a foreign woman washed up in a travel bag on Sri Racha Beach near Pattaya, police say they’ve arrested a Taiwanese man for the murder of the woman, his Chinese wife. The gruesome discovery was made by an officer from the nearby naval base. Police yesterday arrested 38 year old Lu Ji Yang of …

  • New upper and lower highway speed limits to be introduced

    New upper and lower highway speed limits to be introduced

    Motorists using the right lane of any Thai highway or motorway, with more than four lanes of traffic, and drive slower than 90 kilometres per hour, will face charges in the future. A proposal to raise the speed limit to 120 kilometres per hour is also being considered. The new regulations are expected to be ready by next month. The…

  • New rules for Royal road motorcades around Thailand

    New rules for Royal road motorcades around Thailand

    His Majesty King Maha Vajiralongkorn has expressed concern about the motorcades of Royal Family members inconveniencing public road users. Around Thailand, when a member of the Royal Family travels by road, the roads are routinely closed off and hundreds of police stationed along the well-planned route to hold off traffic until the motorcade has passed through. Now HM The King…

  • Central Thailand farmers ignore orders to stop burning off their sugar cane

    Central Thailand farmers ignore orders to stop burning off their sugar cane

    Stick your burning ban up your 2.5 micron particulate! Local sugarcane growers in Nakhon Sawan, central Thailand, are burning their fields at night despite authorities’ ban on the practice. It appears little to nothing is being done to curb the practice which is one of the main causes, if not the main cause, of the smoke and haze problems in…

  • Killer in Lop Buri gold shop attack may be ex-military

    Killer in Lop Buri gold shop attack may be ex-military

    Police now believe the attack at a Lop Buri gold shop in central Thailand last Thursday that killed three, including a two year old boy, may have been carried out by a former military officer. Four others were wounded in what appeared to be a botched robbery. A high ranking police source, speaking on condition of anonymity, told reporters that…

  • Police doubt gold robbery was the motive for deadly Lopburi attack

    Police doubt gold robbery was the motive for deadly Lopburi attack

    Police and authorities now suspect that the motive for Thursday’s brutal and deadly attack, which killed three, including a toddler, may not have been robbery. The lone gunman stormed into a gold shop at a Robinson’s Shopping Centre in Lopburi, Central Thailand, and systematically shot and killed customers and shop staff. The Crime Suppression Division is running background checks on…

  • Murdered foreign woman’s body found in travel bag on a Sri Racha beach

    Murdered foreign woman’s body found in travel bag on a Sri Racha beach

    Chon Buri police are seeking a suspect after the body of a foreign woman washed up in a travel bag at Bang Phra Beach in the province’s Sri Racha district, north of Pattaya. The victim was stuffed inside a black travel bag with red patterns. Her nationality remains unknown. The woman was dressed in a camouflage shirt, black shorts, and white running…

  • Drought prompts Tesco Lotus to increase bottled water production

    Drought prompts Tesco Lotus to increase bottled water production

    Tesco Lotus, the Thai division of Britain’s biggest retailer, is boosting bottled water production to help customers cope with drought. The chain says it will increase production of its own branded bottled water and also increase orders of other brands to sell at its branches nationwide, in response to this year’s drought and water shortages, which is predicted to be the…

  • Two motorbike thieves nabbed in Phuket

    Two motorbike thieves nabbed in Phuket

    Two men have been arrested in Phuket last night. They’ve been charged with stealing motorcycles and then reselling them. One of the arrested men is an unemployed 36 year old tour bus driver. According to police, he was able to convince a 21 year old accomplice, who was his neighbour, to help him steal the motorcycles,. The stolen motorbikes were…

  • Guns, tanks and political speeches. Just another Children’s Day in Thailand.

    Guns, tanks and political speeches. Just another Children’s Day in Thailand.

    Children’s Day has come and gone for another year. As usual, the media like to follow the Thai PM in the hope of a perfect photo of him and an unsuspecting Thai child. The prime minister certainly enjoys the annual interaction and appears more comfortable surrounded by children than performing in Parliament. It’s also a day that the Thai armed…

  • 5 dead, 8 injured as tourist passenger van slams into rear of broken down truck in central Thailand

    5 dead, 8 injured as tourist passenger van slams into rear of broken down truck in central Thailand

    Five tourists have died and another eight injured after their passenger van slammed into the rear of a parked ten wheel truck that had broken down. The incident happened outside the Ban Noi PTT petrol station in Nong Phai district on the Saraburi to Lomsak Road. The van was on its way from the south to Khao Khor in Petchabun,…

  • Bangkok haze and smog continues over the weekend

    Bangkok haze and smog continues over the weekend

    There is unlikely to be much respite of the air pollution shrouding Greater Bangkok this weekend. And the PM is urging people to inform a hotline of any vehicles belching smoke and fumes into the Bangkok sky. The Pollution Control Department says the smog, which saw just about all of the 50 air quality stations hitting levels of PM2.5 over…

  • Senior police double down with their praise of the new Biometrics system at Thai airports

    Senior police double down with their praise of the new Biometrics system at Thai airports

    Police are doubling down with their overt support of the new biometrics system at airports. A high-level disagreement over the 2.1 billion baht contract for the biometrics equipment and installation, is emerging as the reason for last yea’s mystery side-lining of the former head of Thailand’s immigration Bureau, Surachat Hakparn. Ever since the introduction of the systems at airports across…

  • Call centre raid in Bangkok – French citizens arrested

    Call centre raid in Bangkok – French citizens arrested

    Ten French citizens have been arrested on charges of working illegally at an international call centre in Bangkok. Immigration officials were acting on a tip off and had already obtained a court-authorised search warrant to enter the building on Soi Thong Lor 25 in Wattana, central Bangkok. The building was a four-storey house modified for office work. Speaking to the media…

  • Lone gunman storms into Lopburi gold shop and kills three people – VIDEO

    Lone gunman storms into Lopburi gold shop and kills three people – VIDEO

    Police are now on the hunt for the Lopburi gold-shop robber who has killed three and injured four. The man stormed into a Robinson Department Store gold shop last night killing three people as he walked in. He shot without hesitation and paid no attention to the people he’d shot. One of them was a young boy. The gunman also…

  • Crunching the numbers on Phuket’s hotels – 2020

    Crunching the numbers on Phuket’s hotels – 2020

    PHOTO: Travel 141 Bill Barnett from c9Hotelworks, crunches the numbers and reports on some challenges for Thailand’s largest island and most popular tourist destination, outside of Bangkok. Robust passenger arrivals in the second half of 2019 highlighted by growth in Indian tourists helped rebalance the island’s tourism sector, according to the C9 Hotelworks newly released Phuket Hotel Market Update (link…

  • Three killed, others injured in Lopburi gold shop robbery – VIDEO

    Three killed, others injured in Lopburi gold shop robbery – VIDEO

    Three people are now dead and another four injured after a lone gunman entered a Lopburi gold shop, shooting customers and then robbing the store (video below). Lopburi is about 150 kilometres north of Bangkok. The armed robbery took place at a gold shop in Robinson Department Store in the main city district of Lopburi province Speaking to the media…

  • Thailand Yacht Show 2020 opens in Phuket

    Thailand Yacht Show 2020 opens in Phuket

    The fifth Thailand Yacht Show is now open at the Royal Phuket Marina in Koh Kaew. The annual on-water yacht-fest features an array of over 50 luxury yachts and boats, including several world and Asian premieres, from the region’s leading brokers. The show runs until January 12 and is open from 11am – 7pm nightly. The overall intention of the…

  • Former immigration supremo says gunshots linked to airport biometrics project

    Former immigration supremo says gunshots linked to airport biometrics project

    “There’s only one motive” – Surachat Hakparn The former Thai immigration police chief Surachat Hakparn, aka.”Big Joke”, denies that the incident, where gunshots were fired into his car on Monday, was a staged stunt. But he has addressed a media scrum speculating the incident is linked to the Immigration Bureau’s controversial procurement procedures for its biometrics and smart car projects.…