bbc.co.uk. Glee star Cory Monteith has been found dead in a Vancouver hotel, police say. The 31-year-old, who played Finn Hudson in the Fox TV hit, was found dead at the Pacific Rim Hotel in the city centre on Saturday, said police.

news.sky.com Police say they believe he was alone when he died, and have ruled out foul play. Monteith had voluntarily entered rehab for substance abuse problems in April.

bdnews24.com Three more crew members of Bangladeshi cargo vessel MV Hope, which capsized off the Phuket coast earlier in July, have returned home. Nine of them have been rescued and bodies of two others recovered. Six others are still missing.

bbc.co.uk France is preparing to mark Bastille Day as investigations continue into the country's worst rail disaster for 25 years. Six people were killed when a train derailed at Bretigny-sur-Orge, south of Paris, on Friday.


PHUKET: The daily wrap of Thailand news, with a Phuket perspective, plus relevant reports from national and international media. Beware of inconsistent imitations.

andrew-drummond.com Briton David Fletcher - exposed as a convicted child sex abuser in Britain before opening up a children's ''charity'' on a Phnom Penn rubbish dump - is to be extradited to Cambodia within the next 90 days. The Thai courts have approved his extradition to face a 10 year jail sentence for rape.

gawker.com Bay Area news station KTVU just reported that the pilots of Asiana's disastrous flight 214 were the crack team of ''Sum Ting Wong,'' ''Wi Tu Lo,'' ''Ho Lee Fuk,'' and ''Bang Ding Ow.'' Despite the names obviously being just a bunch of racist jokes, KTVU, which has since apologized for the report, says in a statement given to Gawker - and read on the air - that an NTSB official confirmed the names to them

bangkokpost.com The sister of an American man fatally wounded in Bangkok after a dispute with a taxi driver last weekend fears the victim's Thai family will face financial ruin as a result of his death. Troy Lee Pilkington died after being attacked with a long knife about 8.30pm on July 6. Taxi driver Cherdchai Utamacha, 32, has confessed and been charged with murder.

scmp.com Two Thai women lured to Hong Kong with the promise of well-paid jobs but forced to work in a brothel made a daring escape last week, hiding at the airport before being rescued by Thai officials.

rfa.org Authorities are to investigate reports that hundreds of Rohingya Muslims have been undergoing military training to carry out terrorist acts against Buddhist communities in western Myanmar's restive Rakhine state, a government spokesman said.

bangkokpost.com Claims of a woman being brutally raped as well as trafficking allegations involving children are bringing into serious doubt the shelters charged with protecting the group in Thailand.

independent.co.uk British PM David Cameron is being urged to demand an end to the violence against Burma's Muslim minority when he meets the country's President Thein Sein in London on Monday. Campaigners say Burma risks becoming ''the next Rwanda,'' with chilling echoes of the build-up to the 1990s genocide in evidence.

theage.com.au About 1200 members of Burma's Rohingya Muslim minority have reached Australia by boat in the past year. Opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi has confirmed plans to visit Australia in December.

irrawaddy.org The winds of change are carrying a bad smell. Anti-Muslim hate speech and riots have spread to major cities, and Buddhist monks are aggressively interfering in our multi-ethnic polity by pushing a draft law that restricts inter-faith marriages.

time.com How Thailand's Botched Rice Scheme Blew a Big Hole in its Economy. The plan was a political no-brainer, except for one problem: Thailand's government underestimated how quickly the market can kick back at any would-be puppeteers. Exactly one week after Thailand slashed exports, India lifted its export ban, flooding the market with 10 millions tons of rice.

bbc.co.uk At least 18 people have been killed in a crash between a bus and a lorry carrying gravel in a Moscow suburb. Another 25 people were injured in the incident, which happened in the village of Oznobishin, about 40km south of the Russian capital.

scmp.com Ireland's High Court has rejected a US request to detain Edward Snowden if he lands on Irish soil because the request lacked the necessary details for it to do so.

scmp.com Cambodia's self-exiled opposition leader announced that he would return to his homeland this Friday, less than two weeks before his beleaguered party challenges entrenched Prime Minister Hun Sen.

irrawaddy.org With the winning bids for Burma's three major new airport projects due to be announced by the end of this month, officials say the contracts are necessary, given that the government hopes to draw more than seven million tourists to the country by 2020.

scmp.com Destination weddings are growing increasingly popular among China's couples, with spending on weddings reaching 600 billion yuan a year, said Yang Se, chief executive of the Beijing-based IdoIdo wedding service. Phuket and Bali ranked higher than Okinawa as wedding destinations for Chinese nationals because they were allowed to apply for visas on arrival, Yang said.

thehindu.com Ten Things to Do on Phuket. 10. Thai Boxing. Men and boys may find Muay Thai (Thai Boxing) quite interesting - for that little bit of violence!



irishtimes.com Singha All Stars 1 Manchester United 0: David Moyes's first game as Manchester United manager ended in defeat as Teeratep Winothai scored the only goal for Singha All Stars in Bangkok. No manager likes to lose, especially their first game for a new club, and in this instance, replacing a man who served for 26 years and won 13 Premier League titles.

bangkokpost.com The Premier League champions cannot even say the goal was against the run of play after scorer Teeratep Winothai had had two of the best chances of the game up to that point.

guardian.co.uk Maria Sharapova has announced that Jimmy Connors is to be her new coach. The world No2 split with her previous coach Thomas Hogstedt on Friday, after three years of working together.

independent.co.uk Ian Bell is confident his best Ashes performance will be enough to ensure England take a 1-0 lead in the series after the opening Test. Bell's 109 helped England set Australia 311 to win and they will be favourites to finish the job at a Trent Bridge today. At the close, Australia were 174 for six, needing 137 more runs for victory.



July 17-21 Cape Panwa Hotel Phuket Raceweek

July 20-21 Toyota Motorsport Festival Phuket City

July 22 Arsarnha Bucha Day

August 12 HM The Queen's Birthday

October 5-13 Phuket Vegetarian Festival

October 23 Chulalongkorn Memorial Day

October 29-November 3 Womens' volleyball, Karon beach

November 17 Loy Kratong Day

November 24-December 1 Challenge Laguna Phuket Tri-Fest. Laguna Phuket

December 5 HM The King's birthday



January 9-12 Phuket International Boat Show, Royal Phuket Marina

November 14-21 Fourth Asia Beach Games, Phuket