khunjeff

These sales are all to large Thai corporations or developers. No "doners" are involved.

It's unfortunate, but it wouldn't be the first such sale, and won't be the last. Governments see how much they can make by selling their land in city centers and moving to office buildings, and they never really consider the intangible benefits of keeping a visible presence in the middle of town. If I recall, didn't the Dutch previously sell part of their land on Wireless in the late 80s? And the Spanish sold their property just up the road in the early 90s, and of course the UK sold the front of its embassy, and then the rest. Sad.

It would be nice if they could tell us exactly what this scam was.

The only "concerns" are from taxi drivers who are offended that their long-standing free rein to cheat passengers has been infringed upon. How about "engaging" the traditional taxis to comply with the laws about using the meter and not refusing fares? ...which traditional taxis do not do. Is that "fair"?

Hitachi's safety system, not Suvarnabhumi's, but a good outcome in any case.

Over the past 30 or so years, the city has purchased and deployed at least two different computerized traffic control systems, at a cost of millions of dollars. Both were turned off after the police complained that they could do a better job, so we went back to a guy in a booth playing with the lights at every intersection. Let's hope this new system will be given a fair chance.

I guess that's better than their usual strategy, which is to sue the people questioning Thailand's safety for defamation...

Based on this report, that is in fact all they're doing - there appears to have been virtually no tangible progress on any of these grand projects. And no, "nearing completion of bidding documents" and "ha[ving] several high-profile projects awaiting cabinet approval" doesn't count as "progress" for projects that have been talked about for years, and sometimes decades.

...all of which has absolutely nothing to do with cannabis, which is grown legally in Thailand.

The only "dangerous foreign actor" I know is Gerard Depardieu, and he's not on the list 😎

The proper way to deal with that according to law is to refuse the applications of any likely intending immigrants, not to ban everyone in the country from even applying.

Why couldn't they use his face and fingerprints to identify him through immigration's much-vaunted biometric system?

Whenever there's a news story about foreigners behaving badly, we immediately hear that authorities are "enhancing" or "intensifying" immigration inspections, and then we go through the airport and see that absolutely nothing has changed. There is no "pre-entry screening" - the TDAC is not an ETA. As soon as you hit "submit", you instantly get a QR code. No one is reviewing the information - all it does is record your responses and send a confirmation. And no, foreign embassies are not giving Thai immigration access to databases regarding their citizens - this is the same absurd claim they made when they introduced APIS (Advance Passenger Information System) a number of years ago.

Oh, so then everything is fine, nothing to see here 😅

More accurately, that decision was made by RFK Jr. "“This decision bypasses a long-established, evidence-based process used to ensure vaccine safety and ignores the expertise of independent medical experts, including members of the CDC committees who are examining the evidence regarding the vaccine to make recommendations for the fall,” said Dr. Sean O’Leary, chair of the American Academy of Pediatrics Committee on Infectious Diseases"

Wow. Where to begin? This is so patently absurd that, as Trink used to say, "any comment would be superfluous"...! A long-standing bilateral agreement allows Vietnamese to enter Thailand without a visa for 30 days. There have been no changes to this policy in recent memory. Sounds an awful lot like someone who doesn't like the competition 🤔 Ah, yes, the famous 3-5 month "standard tourist visas" - perhaps people shouldn't comment on matters about which they clearly know nothing! And by the way, stop by the Thai consulate in Saigon and see how many Vietnamese are applying for tourist visas. Hint: there aren't any, because they all enter visa-free. Clearly he doesn't read ASEAN Now. From March 15: "Thai police launched a nighttime operation in Soi Nana, part of Bangkok's bustling Sukhumvit area, leading to the arrest of 13 foreign women suspected of engaging in sex work. "Among the detainees were women from Tanzania, Uzbekistan, and Vietnam." https://aseannow.com/topic/1354668-police-raid-soi-nana-arrest-foreign-women-for-suspected-prostitution/

Normally it's an outpatient procedure.

Thailand's wine industry is a virtual nonentity - it's difficult to find Thai wines to purchase at retail stores, even if one wanted to buy them. (I do, however, enjoy visiting Thai vineyards, which usually have nice restaurants.) Taxes on wine here are essentially a luxury tax, not a protectionist measure. https://silklegal.com/wine-tax-in-thailand-a-protectionist-barrier/

For wines selling at US$100+, which are consumed by less than 1% of the Thai population, and rarely in large volumes at one sitting? That seems completely unbelievable.

It's a lot more complicated than that, which makes the pricing structure very complicated to figure out - there are import duties, VAT, and two different types of excise tax, one based on value and the other on alcohol content. https://www.meiningers-international.com/wine/news/thailand-slashes-taxes-wine

That's for Cambodia, not Vietnam.

So why was he using the fake passport? Obviously it would have been detected on arrival in Israel, so the scam wouldn't have gotten very far 🤔

What connection does this have with the mission of the Tourist Police?

This "recent" decision happened over a year ago 🙄

I went to his old restaurant and his new place a few times. The food and drinks are always great, and Harlan is fun to talk to.