South Thailand News
Southern Thailand news, Phuket news, Koh Samui news, and Krabi updates—stay informed on business, tourism, and local events from Trang, Songkhla, Yala, and beyond. Get the latest from The Thaiger, your trusted Southern Thailand news source.
-
Sponsored Long-term life in Thailand? 5 reasons private health insurance pays off in the long run
Thailand is a great place for expats and retirees, offering a warm climate, affordable living, and rich culture. However, healthcare can be tricky for foreigners since they aren’t eligible for public health coverage, and private care can be expensive. Private...
-
New species of orchid found in S.Thailand
A team of botanists from Prince of Songkla University have described a new species of orchid, Aphyllorchis periactinantha, at the Paribatra waterfall in Ton Nga Chang wildlife sanctuary in the southern province of Songkhla. A team of scientists led by Sahut Chantanaorrapint, a professor from Prince of Songkla University biology department first identified the new species. Sahut said the Paribatra…
-
4 bodies with gunshot wounds found in southern Thailand
Residents in the southern province of Narathiwas found the lifeless bodies of three people with gunshot wounds in a sedan truck submerged in the Juerae Lake yesterday. This morning, another dead body was found near the scene. The authorities have reason to believe that the two incidents are interconnected. Buketa Police Station received distressing reports from residents who had discovered…
-
Man runs race in South Thailand wearing Forrest Gump costume
Run Forrest run! One participant in a 160 kilometre race in South Thailand made a splash with his unique attire. The man donned a Forrest Gump costume, complete with a plaid shirt, khaki pants, and a red cap, to the Amazean Jungle Thailand by UTMB 2023. The photo of the runner taken at the starting line in Betong district of…
-
Woman accused of being a witch and sacrificing neighbourhood cats
A woman is in police custody after residents in the southern province of Songkhla accused her of being a witch and sacrificing neighbourhood cats. Yaowaluck Boonchum was accused by a cat owner of being into the occult after killing her five-month-old Persian cat as a sacrifice. The 44 year old woman denied the allegations, saying she is a cat lover,…
-
Tourism in South Thailand province jumped by over 600% last year, officials say
South Thailand’s picturesque beaches and islands continue to reel in tourists. The number of tourists that visited South Thailand’s Surat Thani province last year jumped by over 600% from 2021, according to officials. The province includes the holiday paradise islands of Koh Samui and Koh Tao. Surat Thani Governor Witchawut Jintoe, citing the Ministry of Tourism and Sports, said the…
-
Woman’s body found in water tank believed to be suicide
An elderly woman’s body was discovered in a 2,000-litre water tank behind a house in Nakhon Si Thammarat province. The grizzly discovery was made this morning behind a row house near a commercial building in Mueang district. Police believe the 67 year old woman committed suicide. The woman had been missing since February 15, and her husband has been searching…
-
Police major killed in Yala bomb blast
The police major killed in a Yala bomb blast has been named Pol Maj Prasan Kongprasit, an inspector at Bannang Sata District Police Station. Prasan succumbed to injuries yesterday sustained when a homemade explosive device went off earlier in the day. Four others were wounded by shrapnel when the bomb exploded as they examined a crime scene in the southern…
-
Senior Buddhist monk’s visit to Islamic education centre in Thailand’s Deep South sparks uproar
A senior Buddhist monk in Thailand sparked uproar over his visit to an Islamic education centre in the south. The visit to the centre in Narathiwat province in Thailand’s south came with heavy criticism on the second day of the House debate against the Prayut government yesterday morning. According to Thai PBS World, army officials defended the visit by saying it…
-
CIB arrest 15-year fugitive wanted for double murder
Justice has been finally served on an old open criminal case. After 15 years of being on the run, the Central Investigation Bureau (CIB) of the Royal Thai Police Crime Suppression Division announced a man wanted in connection with the murder of a wealthy couple in Phuket has been arrested. The CIB in Bangkok confirmed an arrest in a cold…
-
Remembering the dead – Koh Tao dive master mystery
Twenty-three years before diving instructor Neil Giblin from Birmingham died on Koh Tao last month, a fellow Brummie diver lost his life there. Giblin is the fifth Koh Tao dive master to die on the island where Ian Jacobs, from Sutton Coldfield, died on January 18, 2000. Jacobs was found at the bottom of a well on the island. Giblin…
-
Railway bomb attack in southern Thailand injures 8 security officers
A bomb attack at a railway in Narathiwat province in southern Thailand yesterday injured eight subdistrict security officers. Officers at Rueso Police Station were informed that subdistrict security officers were injured by an explosion while on duty overseeing the safety of the railway line in the area of Duyae Village, Sao Or subdistrict, Rueso district. Assailants planted improvised explosive devices (IEDs)…
-
Unique durian in South Thailand gets geographical indication status
Unique durians from one South Thailand province have been given geographical indication (GI) status. A new addition to the exclusive club GI products, Durian Sadet Nam Yala, received official recognition from the Intellectual Property Department of Thailand. This move is expected to boost sales and increase income for local durian growers in the southern border province of Yala. Deputy Commerce…
-
South Thailand’s hotel industry booming with increased tourist arrivals
South Thailand is seeing a resurgence in tourism, with room bookings in hotels reaching 85%, according to Sueksit Suwandissakun, the president of the Southern Hotel Association. This is a positive sign for the industry, which has been impacted by the Covid-19 pandemic over the past year. Many hotels in popular tourist areas are already fully booked, with the majority of…
-
Woman accuses police of seizing her car for personal use
A Thai woman accused officers from Sathon Police Station in the southern province of Songkhla of confiscating her car for personal use. The unnamed woman said her car was seized by the police two years ago despite not being involved in a crime. The woman reported that the police arrested her boyfriend in 2021 for possessing Kratom and two tablets…
-
Thailand boosts protection of dolphins in Songkhla Lake
There are as few as 14 Irrawaddy dolphins in Songkhla Lake. The situation is so serious that the World Bank has become involved. Global dolphin experts recently met with local agencies at the World Bank office in Bangkok to come up with better ways to make sure the dolphins survive, and even flourish. The largest-ever convention of dolphin experts included…
-
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…
-
Army ranger shot dead in Thailand’s Deep South
A volunteer army ranger was shot dead at a grocery store in southern Thailand’s insurgency zone on Sunday. Two assailants arrived at the store on a motorbike. One of them entered the shop and fatally shot 38 year old Ilfun Yuso while he was helping out at his wife’s grocery store in Pattani province before fleeing on the same bike.…
-
British woman who fell from KPN balcony goes home
The British woman who fell from a hotel balcony while on holiday on Koh Pha Ngan returned home to the UK after a successful fundraiser brought in £75,000 (3 million baht, US$100,000) in donations. Maddi Neale-Shankster, 21, was on a three-week trip to Thailand with her partner when she fell from the second floor of her accommodation on New Year’s Eve.…
-
Freerunning Frenchmen warned by police after thrillseeking exploits in Thailand
Police warned five thrill-seeking Frenchmen that they face fines and time in prison if they are caught freerunning on residential buildings in Thailand. Trang Provincial Police received complaints from locals yesterday of the Frenchmen, aged between 25 and 30, filming their freerunning (also known as parkour) exploits over eight residential buildings in the southern province of Trang. Residents told police…
-
Drowsy driver crashes sedan into cyclists killing 1, injuring 10
A drowsy driver fell asleep behind the wheel of his sedan and crashed into a group of cyclists on the road in the southern province of Nakhon Si Thammarat. One cyclist was killed and 10 were injured. A security camera on the Nakhon Si Thammarat-Surat Thani Road in the Sichon district clearly shows the incident that happened at 7am on…
-
Insurgents kill defence volunteer in southern Thailand, 2 injured
Suspected insurgents launched a targeted attack on eight territorial defence volunteers in Narathiwat province in southernmost Thailand this morning. One volunteer was killed and two more are injured. At 8am, officers at Si Sakhon Police Station were informed that insurgents detonated a roadside bomb and fired shots with automatic rifles at Si Sakhon defence volunteers, killing one and injuring two,…
-
Marine department warns boats after trawler sinks in South Thailand
Large waves are continuing to wreak havoc on boats in Thailand’s waters. The country’s Marine Department warned boat operators to be extra cautious after a fishing trawler sank in South Thailand on Saturday night. The trawler sank in the Gulf of Thailand about 18.2 nautical miles off the coast of Pak Phanang district in Nakhon Si Thammarat province. Fortunately, marine…
-
Man bites dog: Dog-eating Thai man gets three months
A dog-eating Thai man has been sent to prison for three months for killing, cooking and eating his pet dogs, according to the Soi Dog Foundation. The charity said on Facebook yesterday that concern was raised by Soi Dog mobile clinic staff who encountered a puppy in the Chalerm Prakiat district of Nakhon Si Thammarat with a deep laceration to…
-
2 missing Maniq men presumed dead in a cave in southern province
Authorities believe the two Maniq men who went missing a week ago died in a mountainous cave in the Kong Ra district in the southern province of Pattalung. People from the Maniq ethnic group, also known as Sakai, asked local forest rangers and a rescue team to search for the two men, Tong and Waeng Rakkongra, who went missing a…
-
Southern Thailand’s Hat Yai railway targeted again
Train services between Hat Yai and Khlong Ngae in southern Thailand‘s Songkhla province were temporarily suspended again yesterday when officials discovered that several parts of the railway track had been removed by suspected insurgents. Services on the railway, which connects Hat Yai in southern Thailand to Padang Besar in Malaysia, resumed on New Year’s Day after the track was repaired…
-
Tragic hero – lifeguard, 10 year old, drowned in new year beach tragedy
The body of a 10 year old girl who had been swept away by strong waves from a Songkhla beach, was found washed ashore this morning, near the scene of the new year beach tragedy. Rescue teams searched the area throughout last night and this morning for the lost child who was washed away as she was playing with two…
-
Local vets unable to save Koh Pha Ngan green sea turtle
The injured green sea turtle washed ashore on Koh Pha Ngan on Friday night died of its injuries, according to the local vets who were unable to save the injured chelonian. Quickly on the scene, a group of conservation volunteers, Phangan Sea Guardians, was alerted by villagers who came across the green sea turtle (Chelonia mydas) on Chaloklum Beach and rushed…
-
No New Year’s Eve cheer from Deep South insurgents
New Year’s Eve sparked may have sparked hundreds of thousands of celebrations throughout the kingdom last night but festive cheer was in short supply as insurgency continued its reign of terror in the Deep South. Police reported several incidents last night intended to create a disturbance in four districts of the southern border province of Pattani last night. The incidents,…
-
Wedding turned into a bloodbath after groomsman shoots his friend
A wedding is supposed to be one of the happiest days of your life but for one couple it will be memorable for another reason after a groomsman turned the ceremony into a bloodbath by shooting another groomsman after their girlfriends started fighting. The gunman and his girlfriend are now on the run in Trang, southern Thailand An officer from…
-
Police arrest boyfriend of murdered girlfriend dumped in a garbage bin
The man accused of murdering and dumping his girlfriend’s body in a garbage bin at the Khao Sok National Park at the border of Phang Nga and Surat Thani, surrendered to police yesterday. He allegedly admitted that jealousy drove him to lose his temper and commit murder. The murderer, Sukhon Kaewprapas, surrendered at Kapong Police Station in Phang Nga three…
Don't forget to check out some other things to do in Thailand - get help starting a business or finding a job in Thailand, buy Thailand property, rent a yacht or book a medical procedure worldwide.