bangkokpost.com Seagate Technology, a world leader in hard disk drives and data storage equipment, has earmarked 15.3 billion baht to expand its Nakhon Ratchasima factory under a five-year plan.

smh.com.au In a shock move, it has been confirmed that the hugely popular and influential host Jon Stewart is leaving The Daily Show, after helming the program since 1999.

washingtonpost.com The US is considering basing navy vessels in Australia, its main South Pacific ally, Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Jonathan Greenert said.

centreforavaiation.com Competition in Thailand's will intensify as Thai Lion Air expands. Thai Lion has quickly established a significant presence on a handful of trunk routes and will likely be competing on all the main domestic routes of Nok Air and Thai AirAsia by the end of 2015.


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



bangkokpost.com ''People say I am wrong to have staged the coup. Yes, I was wrong but now I have done it I am ready to sacrifice myself to get what is right and just. I think of it as turning a crisis into an opportunity. We can't resolve all the issues because they have been mounting up for a long time,'' PM Prayuth said.

reuters US aid worker Kayla Mueller, held hostage by Islamic State militants for 18 months, is dead, her family said. But the circumstances were unclear and President Barack Obama vowed to hunt down the culprits.

news.sky.com Australian police say they have prevented an "imminent" terror attack linked to Islamic State (IS) after arresting two men in Sydney. At a news conference it was revealed a machete, hunting knife and homemade IS flag were seized, as well as a video of a man talking about an attack.



nytimes.com Not a single shot has been fired by the military since generals overthrew a democratically elected government here last May. Instead, they have depended on the force of paperwork, reams of it, to bring their opponents under control.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/10/world/asia/thailand-junta-drowning-the-opposition-in-paperwork.html

afp Nearly 4000 black victims were lynched in 12 states in the southern US from 1877 to 1950, an average of more than one a week for 73 years, a new study has revealed. The Equal Justice Initiative, a human rights group in Alabama, spent years researching what it called racial terrorism and visited countless sites where the brutal murders took place.
http://www.smh.com.au/world/nearly-4000-blacks-lynched-in-the-us-from-1877-to-1950-study-20150210-13b93y.html

telegraph.co.uk Brighton College is preparing to open the latest in a series of planned international sister institutions. Income from the outpost in Bangkok, set to open in 2017, will help fund new buildings, bursaries and scholarships at the original college, founded in 1845.

bangkokpost.com Bulgarian Dawod Hamid Aljenabi, 47, has been arrested in Bangkok's Ratchathewi district on charges of ATM skimming, accused of stealing up to 40 million baht.

reuters Dominique Strauss-Kahn has told a French court he did not know the women at ''festive and playful'' sex parties he attended were prostitutes, saying that would have been too risky given his then-role as head of the IMF. Strauss-Kahn, 65, is accused of instigating about a dozen parties he knew involved prostitutes from 2008 to 2011 in the northern French city of Lille, as well as Paris, Washington and Brussels.

scmp.com The launch of a high-profile global advertising campaign for Macau's biggest casino operator which was due to star David Beckham has been scrapped just 48-hours before its planned roll-out.

bangkokpost.com All Thai Taxi, a new service provided by Nakhonchai Air Co Ltd, is a Thai company that strives to compete with international brands like Uber and GrabTaxi, at least on the Thai turf. From May 1 a fleet of 500 Prius sedans will ply Bangkok streets.

ch-aviation.com Thai VietJetAir (Bangkok Suvarnabhumi) majority shareholder, Somphong Sooksanguan, has watered down his 51 percent stake in the carrier to just 10 percent with the long term aim of completely divesting from the start-up. The LCC is still awaiting route clearance to operate scheduled flights from Bangkok Suvarnabhumi to Phuket, Chiang Mai, Hat Yai, and Udon Thani.

AP Two French families whose babies were switched at birth more than 20 years ago have won nearly $3 million in compensation.

smh.com.au Australia has been given the green light - a sequin-covered green flashing light with strobe interludes accompanied by a smoke machine and a euro-disco soundtrack - to compete in the 2015 Eurovision Song Contest. The Australian public, which has increasingly taken the show to heart, will also be able to vote.



Try Phuketwan's Asean Today daily:
http://phuketwan.com/tourism/asean-today-drugs-czar-won-lottery-degrees-virgin-date-pol-pot-burma-fighting-erupts-21858/



reuters After seven months, 14 appearances and 48 shots, Liverpool's Mario Balotelli finally scored a Premier League goal and it proved a precious strike to clinch a 3-2 win over Tottenham Hotspur.

afp Arsenal moved up to fourth place with a 2-1 victory against Leicester.

smh.com.au A boozy night out in a northern Arizona bar ended with blood dripping from a bouncer's head while South Sydney captain John Sutton and teammate Luke Burgess, both the worse for wear, sat handcuffed on the side of the road.
http://www.smh.com.au/rugby-league/league-news/rabbitohs-pair-left-handcuffed-on-curbside-after-boozy-night-out-in-arizona-20150210-13aukj.html

sportinglife.com Thailand makes a return to the European Tour schedule this week after an eight-year absence but there are quite a few strands of form that can be drawn together for Black Mountain Golf Club.



THE SOI DOG Foundation will be holding its fourth mobile event in Phuket on February 21 to offer puppies and kittens for adoption. The event will be held at Macro in Thalang from 11am to 3pm. The kittens and puppets have all been vaccinated and sterilised.

February 14 Valentine's Day

February 19 Chinese NewYear

February 26-28 Phuket Old Town Festival

March 1-15 Heroines festival

March 4-8 Bay Regatta

April 11-13 Phuket Bike Week

April 17-19 Songkran Festival

May 4 Additional public holiday scheduled