PHUKETWAN recognises the importance of Asean with the Economic Community approaching and marks what's happening around the region with a new column, Asean Today.



theguardian.com Thai police have blamed a criminal gang that trafficked Uighur Muslims from China to Turkey for last month's deadly bombing at a Bangkok shrine, saying it was carried out in retaliation for a crackdown on their trade.



afp Malaysia ordered school closures in Kuala Lumpur and neighboring states as worsening haze from Indonesian forest and agricultural fires enveloped the capital in a shroud of smoke.



todayonline.com Indonesia has deployed 3000 soldiers and police officers to fight the fires causing the thick haze that has choked neighboring countries, grounded flights and closed schools in the region. The fires have been exacerbated this year by the effects of the El Nino weather phenomenon, as a prolonged dry season in Indonesia has dried the top soil and fuelled flames.



cnn.com The organisers of the Singapore Grand Prix have said the event will go ahead as scheduled despite the haze shrouding the island city-state.

tnp.sg A former player in the Singapore entertainment scene has been arrested for murder in Japan. American Gregory Gumo, 41, who now lives in Yokohama, Japan, was arrested by police last month for the murder of a 42-year-old Japanese woman, Ms Mariko Akitaya, reported The Japan Times. She had water in her lungs, indicating she was alive at the time her body was dumped in a bay.



aa.com.tr Cambodian officials are to assess a group of four refugees who ''volunteered a few months ago'' to be resettled in Cambodia as part of a landmark deal with Australia, the Interior Minister confirmed. The first four refugees - also three Iranians and one Rohingya - have been living in a gated villa in southern Phnom Penh since their arrival in June.



irrawaddy.org Given the circumstances, we should stop talking about Thein Sein as the reformer and stop talking about the political dynamic in Burma as a ''transition to democracy.'' By doing so we are legitimising a process that is not what it pretends to be.



asianews.it Five unidentified men killed Rev Singkeaw Wongkongpheng, a Laotian Protestant clergyman. The crime took place on September 8, but was made public after Human Rights Watch for Lao Religious Freedom (HRWLRF) drafted a detailed report about the incident.



aljazeera.com Japan has promised Vietnam ships to strengthen its forces in the South China Sea, with the two nations describing large-scale land reclamation there as a threat to peace - a veiled reference to China.

wthr.com Fifty years after he was killed, a Vietnam war hero has finally received a proper burial. The remains of Lt. Neil Taylor returned home to Rangeley, Maine, Monday afternoon. Lt. Taylor was a Navy pilot in the Vietnam War. In his 68th and final mission, he was shot down by enemy fire.



time.com Human-rights groups are accusing the Philippine military of harassing and killing members of indigenous farming communities, who are caught in the crossfire of a long-running communist insurgency on the archipelago's southernmost island, Mindanao.

inquirer.net Only in the Philippines can the promise of corruption be considered a tourist attraction.