Diplomatic Briefing
Your exclusive news aggregator handpicked daily!Archive for Thailand
Newsline: Bhutanese embassy in Bangkok expects to sort out abuse affair
Royal Bhutanese Embassy officials in Bangkok, Thailand, are expecting to resolve today the case of a Bhutanese domestic help, who was allegedly physically abused by the Taiwanese couple she worked for, and was also not paid. “We’re expecting to settle the matter today,” an embassy official said. “We asked them to pay the immigration fine of baht 20,000 for her expired visa, and an air ticket for her to return home.” The victim from Haa was working as a domestic help, along with two other Bhutanese women, for the couple living in Rachadapisek, Bangkok, for the past one and a half years. She fled to the embassy on April 9, alleging that she was battered by the couple on the morning of April 8, for not cleaning the kitchen properly. Since then, she has been staying at the embassy. The woman claimed that she had been physically abused several times by the couple, who had also not paid her salary for 10 and a half months. Her pay was USD 200 a month.
http://www.kuenselonline.com/2011/?p=30751
Consular affairs: British Consulate Reopens in Pattaya
It was great news for the British citizens living in Pattaya when H.E. Asif Ahmad, the British ambassador to Thailand visited our town to announce the reopening of the consulate here and to introduce the new team that will provide consular assistance and services in Pattaya and the surrounds. Leela Bennett, the vice consul in Pattaya stated that the consulate acts as a coordinating center between British nationals and the police, the embassy, the immigration, the hospitals, and their families back home. The assistance includes giving advice on passports, travel in Thailand, security, local laws, health and safety, and other issues that may arise, while more detailed paper procedures are referred back to the Bangkok office. The consulate does not provide visa services but is happy to give advice and guide the applicants to proper channels.
http://www.pattayamail.com/localnews/british-consulate-reopens-in-pattaya-10623?ref=pmci
Newsline: Thai embassy requests extradition of suspected bomber
Thailand requested the extradition of Iranian national Masoud Sedaghatzadeh from Malaysia. The Thai embassy in the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur will submit the request to Sedaghatzadeh’s Malay prosecutors. It is unknown how long it will take Malay authorities to reply, or whether they will comply with the request. Sedaghatzadeh, a suspect in the Bangkok bombings on February 14, fled to Malaysia, where he was arrested by Malay authorities the following day.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/thailand-requests-extradition-of-suspected-bomber/
Newsline: UK envoy in Thailand can’t get an exit visa
British Ambassador Asif Ahmad has extended his tour of service until August rather than leaving in April as planned. It’s not because things are “just getting interesting” here, as the Israelis and Iranians might have us believe, but because his replacement needs more time to learn Thai. Ahmad did all right in that department in his less than a year at the Bangkok embassy, and he learned much else about Thailand besides. For one thing, he always makes sure there’s ground chilli on the dinner table now, even when he’s serving European food. And he discovered that Thailand teems with football fans devoted to Manchester United and his own beloved Liverpool. Ahmad admits he hasn’t been as high-profile sociable as many diplomats because he sticks to the events that have British content. He’s made the cocktail rounds in Bangkok enough, though, to understand how high the “hi-so” go in the hierarchy, but wonders why he hasn’t quite achieved that status.
http://www.nationmultimedia.com/life/UK-envoy-cant-get-an-exit-visa-30176066.html
Newsline: ‘Magnetic-link’ in India, Thai embassy bombs confirmed
Thai investigators are examining a possible link in a bizarre series of explosions in Bangkok and botched attacks targeting Israeli embassy staff in India and Georgia, a senior security official said on Wednesday. Israel accused Iran and its Lebanese ally Hezbollah of being behind the attacks. Iran strongly denies involvement. A man carrying an Iranian passport lost a leg when a bomb he was carrying in Bangkok went off on Tuesday after an earlier explosion, apparently accidental, at a house he was renting. His second leg had to be amputated. A day earlier in New Delhi, a bomb wrecked a car taking an Israeli embassy official to pick up her children from school, police said. The woman was in stable condition on Wednesday after surgery to her spine and liver. Her driver and two passers-by suffered lesser injuries in the attack which police believe was also a botched job. The motorbike rider who stuck the bomb on to the car put it on the opposite side to the petrol tank — if it had been on the tank side it would have been a bigger blast and likely caused fatalities. Israeli officials said an attempt to bomb an embassy car in the Georgian capital Tbilisi failed and the device was defused. When asked whether the explosives used in India and Thailand were the same, Thai National Security Council Secretary Wichian Podphosri Wichian said: “They both have the same magnetic sheets attached to the bombs.” One bomb went off in their Bangkok home. Another was thrown at a cabbie that wouldn’t take them, drawing more attention. Another was thrown towards police but hit either a tree or a truck and bounced back, blowing off the bomber’s leg. Two other men shared the rented house with him. One was arrested at Bangkok’s international airport on Tuesday but the third had slipped past security at the airport and fled to Malaysia, Wichian said. India media quoted Delhi Police Commissioner BK Gupta as saying that a “sticky bomb” not bigger than a palmtop or brick was stuck to the car and would have exploded three to five seconds later. Investigators have recovered magnetic material that formed part of the bomb from the scene. Indian media said investigators were scanning records of all Iranian nationals as well as Lebanese students who arrived in the country in recent months.
http://zeenews.india.com/news/world/magnetic-link-in-india-thai-bombs-confirmed_758534.html
Newsline: Israel points finger at Iran in Bangkok explosion
Israel’s defense minister has accused Iran of being behind a bombing in Thailand. Ehud Barak said Tuesday’s explosion in Bangkok “proves once again that Iran and its proxies continue to perpetrate terror.” He said that Iran and its Lebanese ally Hezbollah are “unrelenting terror elements endangering the stability of the region and endangering the stability of the world.” Barak spoke during an official visit in Singapore. A statement issued by the Israeli Defense Ministry noted that Barak was in Bangkok on Sunday. Police heightened their state of alert throughout Israel on Tuesday following bomb attacks on diplomats in India and Georgia. Officials were also trying to determine whether Israelis were the intended target of an Iranian man carrying explosives who blew his own legs off in Bangkok. Authorities in Thailand said the Iranian was responsible for the three explosions in Bangkok, which wounded four people, including the alleged attacker. Israel Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor said there were no immediate signs that targets were Israeli or Jewish, “but we can’t rule out that possibility.”
http://www.timesonline.com/news/world/middle-east/israel-points-finger-at-iran-in-bangkok-explosion/article_7e9f27b2-0214-52e2-8a6b-c5643f434140.html
Newsline: Iranian wounded by own bomb near Bangkok embassy district
A man thought to be Iranian was seriously wounded in an explosion near Bangkok’s embassy district Tuesday, police and a government spokeswoman said, after he reportedly threw a bomb at police that bounced off a tree and blew up near him. The explosion occurred in the district that houses foreign embassies, including the Israeli Embassy. The Israeli Embassy is more than 800 yards away across a main road. The incident came a day after twin bomb attacks targeted Israeli embassy staff in India and Georgia.
http://photoblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/02/14/10404884-cop-iranian-wounded-by-own-bomb-near-bangkok-embassy-district
Newsline: Australia’s Bangkok embassy sale to net $100m
The Australian Government can expect a $100 million windfall from the sale of its current embassy property in Bangkok, with a new chancery and residence to open in 2016. The embassy, built in 1979 and designed by Australian architects Ancher, Mortlock and Woolley, is close to a main thoroughfare and is considered by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade to be a major security risk. The new premises are forecast to cost more than $200 million, reflecting stepped-up security after the 2004 bombing of the Australian embassy in Jakarta, which left 11 dead and more than 160 wounded. The blast highlighted the more dangerous climate for Australians in Asia because of the regional terrorist group Jemaah Islamiyah. The new chancery and residence buildings will be reinforced and designed to mitigate blasts. A perimeter security wall, CCTV cameras and appropriate lighting will prevent unauthorised vehicle and pedestrian entry. A director with property group Colliers Thailand, Simon Landy, said the existing 12,700sqm freehold embassy property would be keenly sought once it hit the market. Mr Landy said a 2011 valuation of $46million by Australian officials was too low and the embassy property was likely to fetch more than $96 million based on recent sales nearby. A new embassy site, adjacent to the Japanese embassy, covers 16,100sqm with a 30-year lease. The agreement offers an extension for a further 30 years.
http://www.canberratimes.com.au/news/national/national/general/bangkok-embassy-sale-to-net-100m/2426660.aspx
Newsline: Israeli embassy, U.S. tourists among likely targets of Bangkok bomb plot
Police raids in Bangkok, Thailand, which netted a suspected Hezbollah operative Thursday and the makings of bomb-making materials Saturday, represent “one of the most credible Israel-focused threats overseas in a long time,” said NBC News analyst Roger Cressey, and “very much the real deal” adds NBC News analyst Mike Leiter. The two analysts referred primarily to the Saturday raid where police confiscated more than 8,800 pounds (4,000 kilograms) of urea fertilizer and several gallons of liquid ammonium nitrate found in a warehouse in Samut Sakhon, on the western outskirts of Bangkok. Officials in the U.S. and Israel said Hezbollah could have been planning an attack on the Israeli embassy in downtown Bangkok, near various tourist sites, say Cressey and Leiter. Hezbollah, a Shi’ite Islamist group in Lebanon backed by Syria and Iran, is on the U.S. blacklist of foreign terrorist organizations. Information that led to the raid was relayed to Thai police by Israeli intelligence. Police detained a Swedish national of Lebanese origin with alleged links to pro-Iranian Hezbollah militants on Thursday. The intelligence indicated a plot could be carried out between Friday and Sunday. Cressey said the fear was that Hezbollah was constructing a large bomb that would have caused a devastating blast in an area that many Americans visit. “There would have been a lot of collateral damage,” said Cressey, a former member of the U.S. National Security Council staff. As for the rationale for the attack, Cressey said, “All theories make sense. Can’t rank order them yet,” while Leiter noted, “It’s pretty consistent with the increase in tension between Israel and Iran.” Iran has vowed revenge for the killings of its nuclear scientists, which it has blamed on Israel and the U.S. One possibility raised by both is Hezbollah revenge for the Israeli killing on Imad Mugniyah, the Hezbollah leader who died in a car bombing in downtown Damascus nearly four years ago on February 12, 2008. Mugniyah was responsible for many anti-American and anti-Israeli terrorist attacks, including the bombing of the U.S. embassy in Beirut in 1983, the Marine Barracks bombing in 1983 and the bombing of the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires in 1992. Hezbollah vowed revenge for that killing but never carried out attacks that it tied to Mugniyah’s death. National police chief Priewpan Damapong told reporters the suspect, named as Atris Hussein, had given police an address where bomb-making material was being kept. Priewpan said the suspect had maintained that his group had not planned an attack in Thailand but intended to transport the substances to a third country, which he would not name. Thai officials have seemed irritated by travel advisories issued by the U.S. and Israeli governments, followed by several more since Friday. Foreign Minister Surapong Towijakchaikul said diplomats from countries that had issued warnings would meet with him for an explanation. Yingluck also instructed the defense ministry to consult U.S. embassy officials to discuss its terror warning and seek a retraction. However, an embassy spokesman later said the terror warning to its citizens was valid and the United States had no plan to rescind it.
http://openchannel.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2012/01/17/10176623-israeli-embassy-us-tourists-among-likely-targets-of-bangkok-bomb-plot?chromedomain=usnews
Newsline: 14 embassies issue warnings about terrorist attacks in Thailand
As the Thai government of Yingluck Shinawatra continues to say there’s nothing to worry about, 14 countries have now issued warnings about possible terrorist attacks in Bangkok, Thailand. The first warning came on Friday, when the US warned its citizens to be on the alert, and to stay away from popular tourist attractions in Bangkok. The British embassy soon followed suit, followed by the Australians and a number of other European nations. Meanwhile, the Pheu Thai government of Yingluck Shinawatra continues to release statements from the ridiculous to the clueless. Soon after the first US embassy warning was released on Friday, Yingluck’s government said there was “nothing to worry about”, as one suspected Hezbollah terrorist had already been arrested. This was followed on Saturday by a statement from the Thai police chief who said “terrorist attacks had now been cancelled”, as the terror suspect had told the police this was the case.
http://www.examiner.com/asia-travel-in-national/14-countries-issue-warnings-about-terrorist-attacks-thailand
