Regional news from Southeast Asia in English — ASEAN politics, economy and diplomacy, covered by Thai PBS World.
The Criminal Court today rejected former Thai PM Thaksin Shinawatra’s request to travel to Indonesia to attend an ASEAN meeting, stating that there are no adequate reasons to allow him to leave the country.
Deputy Prime Minister Phumtham Wechayachai, Foreign Minister Maris Sangiampongsa and Justice Minister Tawee Sodsong will fly to China’s Xinjiang province on March 18th, to visit the 40 Uyghurs deported from Thailand on February 27th.
Singapore on Tuesday said it would consider caning scammers as the city-state doubles down on swindling syndicates following record high scam losses.
A total of 93 out of 119 Thais sent back to Thailand from Cambodia since last Saturday are to be escorted to the Criminal Court for further detention, pending interrogation.
China’s assistant public security minister, Liu Zhongyi, has shifted his assignment from Thailand to Cambodia to help crack down on scam call centers.
Most of the 119 Thais deported from Cambodia recently are believed to have gone there illegally, to work for scam centres in the Poipet border town. Seven of them are wanted by Thai police, according to Pol Lt-Gen Trairong Phiwpan, commissioner of the Cybercrime Investigation Bureau (CIB).
The Thai military has stepped up road checks near the Thai-Cambodian border, in Karb Choeng district of Surin, to prevent scammers fleeing the crackdown in Myanmar from setting up again in Cambodia’s Casino City in O Samet in Oddar Meanchey province.
The Karen Border Guard Force (BGF) has sent a list of the names of 7,141 people of about 28 nationalities, who it has rescued from scam call centres in Shwe Kokko and KK Park in Myanmar’s Myawaddy township, to Thailand’s Ratchamanu Task Force for processing.
Long queues of cars, extending up to 5km, are waiting in Myanmar’s Myawaddy border township to cross the First Thai-Myanmar Friendship Bridge into Thailand’s Mae Sot to refuel.
The second ASEAN Future Forum (AFF) will be held in Hanoi on February 25-26, featuring special guests, including presidents and high-level representatives from ASEAN member states. The forum has become an annual event where government officials, scholars, and private sector leaders discuss key issues related to ASEAN’s future.
The last 128 of the current cohort of Chinese citizens, transferred into Mae Sot district of Thailand’s Tak province from the Myawaddy border township, are being repatriated today on China Southern Airlines flights chartered by the Chinese government.
The Democratic Karen Buddhist Army (DKBA), an ally of Myanmar’s government, has announced that it will cease helping or taking care of trafficked foreigners in its territory, because it cannot afford the high costs.
