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South Korean President to visit Thailand next week
The South Korean President Moon Jae-in and Madame Kim Jung-sook have accepted an invitation to visit Thailand for three days from September 1. During the visit, President Moon will deliver a keynote speech at the Thailand-Korean Business Forum. The president will meet PM Prayut Chan-o-cha in general discussions to strengthen the strategic partnership between the Republic of Korea and Thailand.…
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Jay Chou fans queue up for four days in KL to grab concert tickets
Jay Chou fans have been queuing up for four days before tickets went on sale for the ‘Mandopop’ king’s concert in Malaysia to ensure they get to see their idol. The All New Jay Chou Concert World Tour will be held in Hong Kong Disneyland in December, Singapore on January 10 and 11 and at the Bukit Jalil National Stadium…
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Tributes paid to Amitpal Singh Bajaj, killed at Centara Grand hotel in Phuket
PHOTO: Southall Sikh Temple Tributes are being paid to the British father, Amitpal Singh Bajaj, who was reportedly attacked and killed trying to protect his family at a beach hotel in Phuket. The incident followed a next door guest reacting badly to a noise complaint and allegedly barging into the family room and attacking Amitpal. Amitpal, from Southall in west…
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Leonardo’s Instagram post draws attention to Thailand’s dugongs
Hollywood star, environmentalist and Instagrammer, Leonardo DiCaprio, has posted the story of Marium the baby dugong in Thailand who died after ingesting plastic. “A beloved baby marine mammal in Thailand has died after consuming plastic and experiencing shock,” he wrote in his instagram post, referring to Thai officials’ announcement on Saturday of the death of the dugong. “The young dugong,…
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Southern insurgency suspect dies after 35 days in coma
PHOTO: Adbulloh Benjakat Abdulloh Esor Musor, left in a coma after being interrogated at a notorious southern Thai detention centre in Pattani, died yesterday, as pressure mounts on the Thai army to release further findings of a probe into the case. The man, a suspected insurgent allegedly tortured during his brief military custody being questioned after his arrest on July 20,…
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New Robinsons Tower in Singapore reaches for the sky with a green thumb
Thailand’s capital could never be accused of having one of the world’s most interesting skylines. Except for maybe the Mahanakorn ‘lego building’, there is little cutting edge skyline architecture in Bangkok. It’s a different case a few hours flight south in the Lion City, Singapore. Pushing all sort of limits is the new Robinson Tower in the CBD. The first impression…
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Farmlands flooded in Mukdahan from mountain run-off
PHOTO: The Nation Some 10,000 rai of farmland and a main road have been inundated with run-off from mountains in Mukdahan, north-east Thailand near the Laos border and Mekong River. The roads were cut off yesterday morning. The Dong Luang district chief Somsak Boonchan says the runoff from the Phuphan Noi mountain range was caused by several days of heavy…
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60 million baht of gold stolen in Songkhla heist
Five people have robbed a gold shop in the city centre of Na Thawee district in Songkhla province yesterday (Saturday). The robbers were dressed in military uniforms and armed with assault weapons, fleeing with gold and jewellery valued around 60 million baht. According to the Thai PBS report, the five bandits arrived at the Suchada Gold Shop in a white…
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Phuket’s water bosses claim there will be enough water
PHOTO: Bang Neow Dam in Thalang, just a few muddy ponds Well into the second half of the Phuket wet season and the three main dams are well below capacity, Bang Wad Dam just over 13% capacity and the Bang Neow Dam in Thalang district around 5%, mostly unusable muddy ponds. The newer Khlong Katha in Chalong is at a…
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Airports of Thailand block entrance to new Central Village at Suvarnabhumi
PHOTO: The Nation Please be seated and fasten your seat belts due to severe turbulence at the front of the almost-open Central Village “luxury outlet” shopping area next to Suvarnabhumi airport in Bangkok. A dispute between Airports of Thailand and Central Pattana, the owners of Central Village, has hit some mid-air turbulence after AOT officials set up tents blocking the entrance…
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The road to Vietnam
OPINION Expat blog ‘Dan about Thailand‘ by ThaiVisa’s Dan Cheeseman, has an article about the Thai expats who are looking to regions beyond to plant their flag as the murmurings become a symphony of complaints about their current life in the Land of Smiles. “Living in Thailand for many of us Expats is what dreams are made of. With a…
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British man arrested in Hua Hin for overstaying his visa
PHOTO: Naew Na A 22 year old British man is in police custody in Hua Hin for having overstayed his visa. An official under the command of the chief of Prajuab Khiri Khan immigration handed the man over to the police, as it is understood that he has overstayed his visa by 143 days. SOURCE: ThaiVisa and Naew Na
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Hua Hin to sterilise 600 monkeys in effort to control numbers
PHOTO: Wikipedia Thai PBS World reports that Hua Hin is launching a mass sterilisation of monkeys in an effort to manage the population. The programme is being run by Thailand’s National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation department, and will see 600 long-tailed macaque monkeys sterilised. The monkeys are in the Khao Takiab and Khan Hin Lek Fai hill of Hua…
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US and China ramp up the rhetoric and the tariffs in a day of tit-for-tat
Beijing has unveiled a new round of retaliatory tariffs on the US valued around US$75 billion. China will now place additional tariffs of 5%-10% on US imports starting next week. The tit-for-tat trade war between the world’s two largest economies is causing widespread disruption to supply chains and long-held trade conventions. China’s Finance Ministry says they will also resume tariffs on…
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Norwegian out on bail following death of British man at Centara Grand Resort in Phuket
SCREENSHOT: bbc.com The bbc.com are reporting that a British man died at the Centara Grand Hotel in Phuket in a fight after telling another guest to “keep the noise down” as his wife and son tried to sleep, according to the man’s family. The details in the BBC report conflict with earlier local reports out of Phuket. The BBC report…
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Huawei technology working with the ‘smart city’ project in Phuket
Huawei Technologies impressed participants at this week’s ASEAN Smart Cities Network Conference & Exhibition in Bangkok with its white paper on smart city development in Phuket. The paper aims to drive Thailand 4.0 initiatives to pave the way for major digital and infrastructure development in Phuket, one of Thailand’s pilot smart cities, and to provide insights and guidance on an…
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Thai DJ rounds up stray cats then films killing them for payment
PHOTOS: khaosod.co.th A female DJ has been charged over the killing of 27 stray cats at her home in Thon Buri, according to Khao Sod, a Thai online news portal. According to the police investigation, Miss Wararat Krasae, better known as ‘DJ Sun’, picked up stray cats found on the streets into her home before killing them. The arrest followed…
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Thai’s go west during rainy season – study
Thailand’s rainy season might be bad for the country’s beach hot spots but is typically associated with travel to the western regions of the country, where nature becomes its most beautiful during the period. New data from Hotels.com reveals a 26% jump in searches among Thai travellers for accommodation in the Western region over the past 12 months. The data…
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Thai finance minister confident GDP will pick up next quarter
Deputy PM Somkid Jatusripitak says he is confident Thailand’s gross domestic product will pick up in the fourth quarter as a result of the launch of 316 billion baht economic stimulus package from the Thai government. He claims the new rice price guarantee scheme will also assist the agricultural sector. The Cabinet approved the new packages at its Tuesday meeting.…
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Two people and 1,000 chickens die in Pathum Thani collision
PHOTO: คนช่วยคน จ.ปทุมธานี สายด่วน 1669 Two trailer trucks have collided in Pathum Thani, to the north of Bangkok, killing two people and around 1,000 chickens. The driver and a female passenger were heard screaming for help as their vehicle burst into flames. The chicken were being transported in the back of the truck. Police were alerted at 3.10am about the…
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Biologist calls on Thailand to list all sharks as endangered
PHOTO: Wikipedia Marine biologist Thon Thamrongnawasawat, insists Thailand must place all shark species on its list of endangered animals. His warning is accompanied by Facebook photos showing chopped up blacktip reef sharks being sold on Koh Lanta, in Krabi province. As black tip reef sharks are not listed as endangered, no law is currently being broken. And while the waters…
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British tourist killed at Phuket resort, Norwegian charged
PHOTO: Tourist Assistance Centre A late night fight that broke out at a Karon resort has ended in a Norwegian man killing a British tourist. The fight started at 4.00am, when British national Amitpal Singh Bajaj, who was on holiday with his Singaporean wife and two young children, confronted Roger Bullman over the amount of noise coming from his room.…
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Chiang Rai collision kills truck driver, injures several Chinese tourists
A tourist bus with 19 Chinese tourists on board was heading to the White Temple of Chiang Rai yesterday, when it was involved in a head-on collision with a pickup truck. The truck driver was killed instantly, and several bus passengers were rushed to hospital with injuries. It comes less than a week after 10 Italian tourists were injured, one…
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The second baby dugong ‘Yamil’ dies in Phuket
The second young dugong, being cared for by vets at the Phuket Marine Biological Centre, has died. Yamil, the baby dugong stranded on a Krabi beach on July 1, died of “shock and cardiac arrest” last night (Thursday) after suffering indigestion and gastroparesis. The Department of Marine and Coastal Resources report that Yamil was sent from the Phuket Marine Biological…
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Official complaint filed with the DSI over The Peaks Residences Condominium in Phuket
PHOTO: Inspections at the property in March this year – Kritsada Mueanhawong Bangkok MP Sira Jenjaka has gone ahead and filed a long list of formal complaints over The Peaks Residences Condominium project being built in the hills above Kata Noi in Phuket. The Palang Pracharat MP has also claimed to have had death threats made against him over his…
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German tourist dies after falling from Pattaya condo
A German tourist died after falling from the 15th floor of a Pattaya condo this morning. The Pattaya police station report that they were alerted at 6.30am of a foreigner falling from his room on the 15th floor of View Talay Pattaya Beach Condominium. Police haven’t provided the man’s name, but say he was between 40 and 50 years old and…
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Phuket marine vets report on the progress of dugong calf ‘Yamil’
PHOTO: The Nation A veterinary team at the Phuket Marine Biological Centre has removed the remaining partially-digested sea grass from the 3 month old dugong calf Yamil’s stomach to prevent complications from possible infection. The calf still suffers from excess stomach and intestinal gas, abnormal heart rhythms and occasional seizures. X-ray results showed liquid food is still passing through Yamil’s…
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More than four million guests stayed in an Airbnb on August 10, 2019
“Airbnb has created an opportunity to meet people from all around the world.” – Pim, an Airbnb Host in Thailand Exactly 11 years since Airbnb was founded, the home-sharing hospitality company and ‘accommodation disrupters’ celebrated its biggest night ever, with more than 4 million people spending the night in an Airbnb listing on August 10, 2019. To date, there has…
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Arrival projections for Thai tourism downgraded for 2019
Thailand’s Tourism and Sports Minister Phiphat Ratchakitprakarn has downgraded the forecast for foreign arrivals this year to a range of 39-39.8 million. This is down from the upbeat projections at the start of the year that 40.2 million tourists would arrive in the Land of Smiles. Thai tourism for the first half of 2019 grew only 1.4%, less than expected, prompting…
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John Legend & Chrissy Teigen check out the tastes at a Korat Market
American music legend, John Legend, and his Thai-American wife Chrissy Teigen headed to a Nakhon Ratchasima food market only to be surrounded by locals trying to get a quick selfie. The army of fans surround the musician, his wife and daughter to follow them around the market in the 25 minute Facebook post. It was smiles all around but as…
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