Bangkok

Severe floods caused by monsoon rains killed more than 30 people and displaced tens of thousands in Malaysia and southern Thailand, officials said Tuesday, with both countries preparing shelters and evacuation plans in anticipation of more heavy rain. Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said five days of heavier-than-expected rain that battered the country's east coast last week was equal to the rainfall over the past six months, wreaking havoc in the northeastern state of Kelantan and neighbouring Terengganu. The heavy downpours damaged roads and houses in Kelantan and other parts of Malaysia. Rescue workers used boats to distribute food to victims trapped in their homes. Anwar said it would cost the government an estimated 1 billion ringgit (USD 224 million) to repair infrastructure damaged by the floods. The rain eased over the weekend, but the Meteorological Department forecast heavy rains later Tuesday. Anwar said the government is bracing for another monsoon surge that is .

Airlines have attributed the fare hike to increased operating costs during the holiday season, citing factors such as staffing and logistics

Rescuers took around 30 minutes to free the woman, after which she was taken to the hospital for treatment, local police said

The locked hotel room in Bangkok's Grand Hyatt Erawan, the untouched room service, and the missing seventh guest have deepened the mystery

A plane believed to be carrying WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange has landed in Bangkok on Tuesday, as he is on the way to enter a plea deal with the US government that will free him and resolve the legal case that spanned years and continents over the publication of a trove of classified documents. The chartered plane VJT199 landed after noon at Don Mueang International Airport, north of the Thai capital. It is unclear if the plane is only refuelling or how Assange will continue travelling to the Northern Mariana Islands, a US commonwealth in the Western Pacific, where he will appear in court Wednesday morning Saipan time. He's expected to plead guilty to an Espionage Act charge of conspiring to unlawfully obtain and disseminate classified national defense information, according to the US Justice Department in a letter filed in court. Assange is expected to return to his home country of Australia after his plea and sentencing. The hearing is taking place in Saipan, the largest islan

A British passenger suffered a fatal cardiac arrest, and many were injured when a Singapore Airlines flight encountered severe turbulence mid-air. The plane made an emergency landing in Bangkok

The Boeing 777-300ER plane with 211 passengers and 18 crew was headed to Singapore when it made the emergency landing, the airline said in a statement

Chinese electric vehicle makers are showcasing their latest models, including a flying car, as they take on global rivals at the Bangkok International Motor Show. Companies like BYD, XPeng and Great Wall Motors are quickly growing their sales in Thailand, challenging longstanding market leaders like Toyota, Isuzu and Ford, as they expand exports across the globe. And Thailand, one of the biggest markets in Southeast Asia, a region of more than 600 million people, has made developing its EV market a priority. Tesla launched sales in late 2022, offering its popular Model 3 and Model Y at prices aimed at competing with rivals like China's BYD. BYD, or Build Your Dreams, displayed a wide range of its EV lineup, including its Dolphin, a pure EV that it says runs 490 kilometers (about 300 miles) on a single charge and is priced at 859,999 Thai baht (USD 23,700). At the higher end of the spectrum is the Seal, promising 580 kilometers (about 360 miles) on a charge and costing nearly 1.6 .

Former Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra was released on parole early Sunday from a Bangkok hospital where he spent six months serving time for corruption-related offenses. Thaksin was seen in a convoy of cars leaving the Police General Hospital just before sunrise and is believed to be headed to his residence in western Bangkok. A homemade banner with the words Welcome home and We've been waiting for this day for so so long was seen hanging at the front gate of his house. A polarising figure in Thai politics over the last two decades, Thaksin was in office from 2001 until he was toppled in a 2006 coup. He was later convicted of abuse of power and other misdeeds while in office and returned in August from more than a decade of self-imposed exile to serve his prison sentence. His original eight-year sentence was commuted to only a year by King Maha Vajiralongkorn on September 1. Thaksin had called his convictions politically motivated. Justice Minister Tawee Sodsong confirmed .

US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan and his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi held more than 12 hours of meetings in Bangkok, the White House said Monday. "Over the weekend, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan held more than 12 hours of meetings in Bangkok with his counterpart from the People's Republic of China, Director Wang Yi," John Kirby, NSC Coordinator for Strategic Communications at the White House told reporters at a news conference here. "Sullivan and Director Wang took stock of progress on key issues following the meeting between President (Joe) Biden and (Chinese) President Xi (Jinping) back in November. Now, that includes discussing efforts to resume military-to-military communication, which has occurred; addressing artificial intelligence safety and risks; and advancing bilateral counter-narcotics cooperation," Kirby said. In fact, the launch of a working group on counter-narcotics will begin Tuesday in Beijing. The US delegation will be led by Deputy Homeland ...

Air India is all set to introduce a non-stop service between Kolkata and Bangkok from October 23. Launched during the festive season in Kolkata, this new flight will cater to the need for a convenient direct connection between the two cities, the airline said in a statement on Wednesday. It will operate six days a week from Monday to Friday. Flight number AI-322 will depart Kolkata at 10 pm (local time) to reach Bangkok at 2.05 am (local time) the next day. The return flight AI321 will take off from Bangkok at 3.05 am to land in Kolkata at 4.10 am. The flight will be operated with a narrow-body Airbus aircraft and it will have a two-class configuration business and economy. The direct service to Bangkok will offer an opportunity for Air India passengers to take convenient connections via Bangkok to and from 10 popular destinations in Thailand, Laos, and Cambodia on the network of Bangkok Airways, with which Air India enjoys an interline partnership with seamless connections beyon

The teenage boy who allegedly shot two people dead and wounded five others inside a major shopping mall in the centre of Thailand's capital used a mock handgun that had been modified to fire real bullets, police said Wednesday. The suspect was taken into custody less than an hour after the first gunshots Tuesday afternoon at the Siam Paragon Mall, one of Bangkok's biggest and most upscale shopping destinations. Video uploaded to social media and broadcast on television showed a long-haired teenage boy in the custody of police. Major Thai media reported he was 14 years old and a student at a prominent private school. Recently appointed Police Chief Torsak Sukvimol confirmed only that he is a minor and had a record of being treated for mental illness. Assistant National Police Chief Samran Nualma said at a news conference Wednesday that the weapon used was a plastic gun and adapted to use with real bullets. It has variously been described as originally intended to fire blanks or ...

Local authorities have arrested the suspect with a weapon and are assessing exact casualties, according to Thailand's Central Investigation Bureau

Hundreds of shoppers fled a major shopping mall in the centre of the Thai capital Bangkok on Tuesday afternoon after what sounded like gunshots were heard inside. It was not immediately clear if shots had been fired or there were any casualties, but some frightened shoppers were still hunkering down inside the Siam Paragon Mall. The incident prompted authorities to shut access to a major transit stop nearby as the evening rush hour began and intense rain pounded the city, according to an Associated Press journalist at the scene. First responders could be seen entering the mall as sirens wailed outside. Witnesses said crowds of people left the building, one of several shopping centres in the area popular with tourists and well-heeled Thais alike. Chinese tourist Liu Shiying told the AP from inside the mall that she saw people running and saying someone had opened fire. She said an alarm rang out inside the mall and the lights went out. She is still taking cover inside the mall. We

Air India has entered into an interline partnership with Bangkok Airways that will allow Tata group airline's customers seamless connections to 10 Southeast Asian destinations beyond the Thailand capital. The two carriers have also entered a Special Prorate Agreement that allows them to file 'through fares' on routes covering each other's networks. This arrangement means that a passenger can have a single fare for a single ticket covering all destinations in an itinerary. The partnership enables Air India passengers to take convenient connections via the airline's Bangkok, Hong Kong, and Singapore gateways to and from 10 destinations in Thailand, Laos, and Cambodia on Bangkok Airways' route network, a release said on Thursday. An interline arrangement refers to a pact to issue and accept tickets for flights that are operated by the partner airline. When selling an interline ticket, the operating airlines' own flight numbers are used. The collaboration with Bangkok Airways also ...

Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore, also popular as "Gurudev" and the "Bard of Bengal," died at the age of 80 on August 7 in 1941 and today is his 82nd death anniversary

Shot putter Karanveer Singh has failed an out-of-competition dope test conducted recently and he will be pulled out of the Indian team for the Asian Athletics Championships in Bangkok next week. Karanveer, who trains at the National Institute of Sports (NIS) in Patiala, was earlier named in a 54-member Indian team for the July 12-16 continental championships. The Indian team will leave for Thailand on Saturday night. "Yes, that is correct," Athletics Federation of India (AFI) president Adille Sumariwalla told PTI on Saturday when asked if Karanveer had failed a dope test. The exact date of the dope test and name of the banned substance are not known. Earlier in the day, an Indian team source had said that Karanveer could be left out of the side leaving for Thailand from New Delhi and Bengaluru. The 25-year-old Karanveer had won a bronze in the Federation Cup in May with a throw of 19.05m while he was second behind Asian record holder Tajinderpal Singh Toor in the National Inter-St

With the launch of direct flights connecting Bhubaneswar to Dubai, Bangkok and Singapore under the Viability Gap Funding scheme, the Odisha government is hopeful of doubling its foreign tourist arrivals in the state by 2025 from its pre-pandemic levels, a tourism official said on Monday. A "Viability Gap Funding" (VGF) is a government grant provided to airlines to bridge the gap between the cost of operations and expected revenues. "The target is to double the foreign tourist arrivals by 2025 to 2.5 lakh from the pre-Covid peak of 1.2 lakh witnessed in 2019," Sachin Jadhav, Director of Tourism Odisha, said. The Odisha government has allocated Rs 660 crore in its budget for the current financial year for the tourism sector. With the launch of direct flights with these three cities, we expect a surge in international tourists taking onward flights to Odisha, Jadhav said during the Odisha Tourism Roadshow here. We have shown a more proactive approach in starting direct flights to ...

Pita Limjaroenrat, the 42-year-old Harvard-educated leader of Move Forward, staked his claim to becoming Thailand's prime minister after his party won the most seats

A few flights to Bangkok and Dubai will be operated by Airbus A320 aircraft instead of the wide-body Boeing 787