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) Hunt is on for 11 crocs that escaped from flooded farm
Marksmen cruised rivers in northeastern Thailand on Sunday hunting for 11 crocodiles that scampered away from a farm during floods last week.A total of 34 crocodiles escaped the commercial farm in Nakorn Ratchasima province on Wednesday, but the rest have been shot and killed, said Suwira Phonkoh, an official in the province's special task force to help flood victims.
Many people in the province have been evacuated due to the flooding. Authorities warned the remaining residents about the crocodiles, which were being raised for their meat and skins.
Some of them are as much as 20 feet long, and authorities said capturing them was increasingly difficult. Experts from a Bangkok zoo have been asked to help in the search.
"The area is huge, and the big crocodiles are more skillful and they can dive longer than small ones," Suwira said. More>>
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) KL, Bangkok And S'pore Listed As Good For Aviation Training
SEATTLE, Oct 19 (Bernama) -- Aviation training has been listed as one of the potential areas in which investors here are keen to establish trade links with Malaysia, Singapore or Thailand, says a leading industrialist here. President of the Trade Development Alliance of Greater Seattle, William B. Stafford, said businessmen in Seattle, home to major aerospace industries, with the giant Boeing Commercial Aircraft leading the pack, were keen to venture into the sector. "We have many higher learning institutions like the University of Washington offering studies in aviation technology, plane designing, building plane with composite, maintaining and controlling plane," he said Thursday when meeting a group of eight visiting journalists from Asean (Association of South East Asia Nations). The two-week visit which began from Washington DC last Monday, is organised by the United States' Centre for Foreign Press of the Department of State in conjunction with the 30th anniversary of the "U.S.-ASEAN Dialogue." Stafford said setting up aviation training institution in these countries would not only attract students from the respective countries but also students from China. More>> - (
) Pedophile suspect remains mum on abuse allegations
A detained Canadian pedophile suspect has said nothing about allegations that he sexually abused young boys across Southeast Asia, a Thai police official said yesterday.Christopher Paul Neil, who was arrested in Thailand on Friday following a global manhunt led by Interpol, was "smiling and chatty" during questioning but refused to speak about the child sex allegations, the official said.
"He smiled a lot and talked a lot. He answered questions about his family, the schools he graduated from and other casual topics," Police Lieutenant General Wimon Pao-In said.
"But once questions turned to the child sex allegations, he stopped smiling, only saying that he did not want to answer questions," Wimon said.
The 32-year-old schoolteacher was caught after Interpol made a groundbreaking appeal for the public's help in finding the man seen in 200 Internet photos showing him abusing a dozen young Asian boys. More>>
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) Several firms on US Myanmar blacklist linked to Singapore
SINGAPORE (AFP) - Three companies with strong links to Singapore are among seven firms blacklisted by the United States under fresh sanctions against Myanmar after its deadly suppression of pro-democracy protests.According to President George W. Bush's order the companies which are either based in or linked to Singapore are: Pavo Trading Pte Ltd, Air Bagan Holdings Pte Ltd and Htoo Wood Products Pte Ltd, which is also listed as being from Myanmar's main city, Yangon.
The sanctions were announced Friday and are designed to target organisations with ties to Myanmar's ruling junta in the hope it will pile more pressure on the regime.
"It's about time the US did something like this," said Dave Mathieson, a consultant on Myanmar to Human Rights Watch in Bangkok. More>>
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) Canadian pedophile suspect arrested in northeastern Thailand
BANGKOK, Thailand - The Canadian schoolteacher who has become the world's most wanted suspected pedophile has been arrested by police in northeastern Thailand.The arrest was announced by police Maj.-Gen. Wimol Powintara in Bangkok on Friday. Wimol says the suspect, 32-year-old Christopher Paul Neil, was arrested in the northeastern province of Nakhon Ratchasima.
He is expected to be brought to Bangkok later in the day.
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