A daily wrap of Thailand news, with a Phuket perspective and reports from national and international media.

channelnewsasia.com Thailand recalled its ambassador to Cambodia on Thursday after Phnom Penh appointed fugitive former Thai premier Thaksin Shinawatra as an economic adviser, a senior official said. ''We are recalling our ambassador to Cambodia by this evening,'' Chavanond Intarakomalyasut, secretary to Thailand's minister of foreign affairs, told AFP.

monstersandcritics.com ''This measure was taken to tell the Cambodian government our feelings,'' Thai PM Abhisit Vejjajiva said. ''We see the appointment as interference in Thailand's internal affairs,'' he said. In Phnom Penh, government spokesman Phay Siphan described the recall of the ambassador as ''an overreaction.''

bangkokpost.com Cambodia has appointed ousted premier Thaksin Shinawatra as economic adviser to Prime Minister Hun Sen in a move that seems certain to escalate tensions with Thailand. ''Thaksin has already been appointed by royal decree . . . as personal adviser to Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen and the adviser to the Cambodian government in charge of economy,'' said a Cambodian government statement read on state television.

afp The appointment was announced on state television almost two weeks after Hun Sen first riled Thailand by offering safe haven to Thaksin, who was ousted in a coup in 2006 and is living abroad to avoid a jail term for corruption. Thailand said that the appointment was an internal matter for Hun Sen's government but it would push for the extradition of billionaire Thaksin if he sets foot in Cambodia.

Phuketwan Update British tourist Jim Leonard Derry, age 72, arrived in Thailand on July 28 but has since disappeared. His last known address was in Central Road, Pattaya. Mr Derry was also a frequent visitor to Phuket, where he was a keen fisherman. If you have any information on his whereabouts, please phone Honorary Consul Martin Carpenter on 089 874 9080.

scmp.com The US president's half-brother has told how the presence of their father turned his childhood into a nightmare. ''My father beat me. He beat my mother,'' said Mark Okoth Obama Ndesandjo. The normally press-shy Ndesandjo broke his silence about Barack Obama Snr while speaking to reporters in Guangzhou to promote his new novel, entitled 'Nairobi to Shenzhen'.Ndesandjo, an American raised in Kenya, has been living in Shenzhen for seven years.

TNA Thailand's tourism industry, much affected by domestic political conflicts and the global economic slowdown, has now recovered with about 14 million foreign tourists expected to visit the kingdom in 2009 as earlier targeted, according to Minister of Tourism and Sports, Chumphon Silpa-archa. Mr Chumphon added that a number of charter flights landing at the country's renowned seaside resorts of Phuket, Krabi, Phangnga and Samui also increased in the same period, leading to full hotel occupancy in the areas. [Ed: Yes, this is what the TNA report said.]

scmp.com After almost 10 years of negotiations Shanghai has finally been given the green light to build a Disney theme park, with the announcement coming less than two weeks ahead of US President Barack Obama's first visit to China. The Shanghai Disneyland is set to dwarf the Hong Kong park, and will put the two cities in greater competition as tourism destinations.

nytimes.com Philip Bowring writes: Thais are naturally preoccupied with immediate issues but in the long term they may need to be thinking about how the country will rate 20 years from now against its traditional rivals, Vietnam and Myanmar, long-established nation states of roughly similar size, as well as against the nearby giants, India and China. There is a sense of unease that the nation has lost its momentum. In 20 years Vietnam will have a bigger economy, but for quality of life in an open society, my money would still be on Thailand.


Places to Go As well as the unmissable rubber duck race for charity at Laguna this Saturday, there's a Jazz Brunch at The Mangosteen Resort and Spa in Rawai from 11.30am to 3pm, with singer Bonnie Anderson there to keep everyone cool. (Entrance free, brunch 499 baht, use of the pool after live performance.) And that probably leaves just enough time to get to Karon for the final of the women's beach volleyball.

pattayadailynews.com Lonely Planet's 'Best in Travel 2010' guide has just announced that Thailand is the world's second best-value destination, remaining ''perennially good value'' and the tourism epicentre of Southeast Asia. This apparently is especially true for European tourists for whom Thailand represents one of the least expensive long-haul holiday destinations.

Xinhua Commercial flight movements at the Macao International Airport decreased by 23 percent year-on-year to just 27,813 in the first nine months of 2009. China's Taiwan, the Chinese mainland, Thailand and Malaysia remained the major flight routes in the period, accounting for 39 percent, 24 percent, 10 percent and 9 percent of the total commercial flights, the figures indicated.

Xinhua Bangkok was voted by foreign tourists as the most attractive city to visit among 10 of the 11 member cities of the Asian Network of Major Cities 21, with Thai food the most attractive factor, Thai News Agency online reported. With a score of 7.19 out of 10, Bangkok polled highest with Tokyo voted second.

chosun.com A senior US official has held talks with Burma's prime minister and detained democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi. The meetings are the highest-level dialogue between the US and Burma in more than a decade. US Assistant Secretary of State Kurt Campbell met with Burma's opposition and democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi. The Nobel prize winner was allowed to leave her house, where she has been held under arrest for most of the last two decades.

Associated Press US lawmakers are moving to ban the use of computer laptops and other personal electronic devices in the cockpit to prevent another incident like the Northwest Airlines plane that overshot Minneapolis by 240km. Senator Byron Dorgan, chairman of the aviation subcommittee, said his staff is working on a bill that he expects to introduce in about a week.

cnn.com He's chipped his way through more than a foot of snow and ice to get to Ernest Hemingway. He's walked right up to Al Capone and Karl Marx. He's dragged his mom to visit the infamous cannibal Alferd Packer and just came back from seeing Farrah Fawcett. He is Jim Tipton, founder of Find a Grave, a free online database of burial sites for the famous and otherwise around the globe.

wsj.com Investigators are preparing to begin ripping open the walls of a convicted rapist's home, where they have discovered 10 bodies and a skull in the past week. Anthony Sowell, who lived alone in the house,served 15 years in prison for a 1989 rape. As a registered sex offender, Mr. Sowell was required to check in regularly at the sheriff's office.

Associated Press A Louisiana justice of the peace who refused to marry a couple because the bride was white and groom was black has resigned. Keith Bardwell, who is white, quit the post with a one-sentence statement to Louisiana Secretary of State Jay Dardenne and no explanation of his decision.