bbc.com Germany can cope with at least 500,000 asylum-seekers a year for several years, Vice Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel has said.

afp A Thai court said a Hong Kong photographer detained for carrying a bullet proof jacket and helmet was free to leave the country, although he still could face five years in jail on a weapons charge.

ibtimes.co.uk British academic Wyn Ellis has been released after being held at the Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi Airport jail for four days after he was accused of being a national security threat over a plagiarism row going back as far as nine years.


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 The military regime has pushed back elections and its own exit by 22 months, and took heavy criticism from virtually all sides for its ''new roadmap''.

nationmultimedia.com The foreign business community in Thailand has expressed optimism that political stability will continue despite the National Reform Council's rejection of the constitution draft on Sunday.

afp Pilots at German airline Lufthansa said they will strike for two days this week, continuing a long-running dispute with management over early retirement provisions.



bangkokpost.com A Uighur suspect above told military interrogators he handed off the Erawan shrine killer bomb to the man in the yellow T-shirt just before the blast.

nationmultimedia.com A Chinese national was behind the plot to bomb the Erawan Shrine and has already fled the country, one of the suspects in custody revealed.



smh.com.au Dutch model Yfke Sturm is fighting for her life in an Italian hospital after being run over by a jet-surfboard, according to media reports. The 33-year-old London-based model was on holiday near the southern Italian island of Ischia when the accident happened, according to a report in The Daily Mail.

crikey.com.au Dear Reuters, A few of us have been sitting around in Phuket doing a bit of celebrating after a Thai court threw out defamation and other charges [against Phuketwan journalists] based on a paragraph republished from one of your stories. By Wednesday we started looking for reaction from you, originator of the paragraph.

dvb.no Last week, Alan Morison, the editor of Phuketwan news website, and his colleague, Chutima Sidasathian, were pronounced not guilty of defamation and computer crimes by a judge in southern Thailand. Freedom has been a long time coming - a two-year legal process since their report about the trafficking of Rohingya boatpeople from Burma sparked the ire of some Thai naval officers. Morison speaks exclusively to DVB about the pressures of the trial, the Rohingya issue, and the road ahead.

nationmultimedia.com Thailand's Designated Areas for Sustainable Tourism Administration (DASTA) will soon propose to the government that it turn Loei Airport into an international airport. DASTA has developed many projects including low-carbon tourism in Koh Mak, marine tourism in Phuket and cruising in Pattaya.

walesonline.co.uk A Welsh academic who has been held in detention at an airport in Thailand for five days has been released. Agricultural consultant Wyn Ellis, from Swansea, was stopped at Bangkok's Suvarnabhumi Airport over a dispute arising from the UN report he penned nine years ago.

ft.com The bizarre saga is a microcosm of wider concerns about the ability of well-connected people and powerful institutions in Thailand to use the legal system to target opponents.

bangkokpost.com The Education Ministry is planning to seek help from Cambridge University in England to set up an English study program for Thai students.

nationmultimedia.com A network of local residents called on new Energy Minister Gen Anantaporn Kanjanarat to scrap the national Power Development Plan (PDP). Scheduled for implementation between 2015 and 2036, the plan aims to boost electricity-generating capacity by 57,459 megawatts over the next 20 years via the building of many more power plants in Thailand and purchasing electricity from neighboring countries.

nytimes.com As Europe basks in good feelings over its generosity to thousands of migrants and asylum seekers last weekend, critical voices from the political right and far right are poised to become among the biggest beneficiaries of the continuing flow. Parties that have been growing in opposition to immigration, the influence of Islam and the European Union seized on the decision by Austria and Germany to welcome the migrants, pointing out the difficulty of now shutting the migrant tap.

theglobeandmail.com Walter Palmer, the Minnesota dentist whose killing of Cecil the lion sparked a global backlash, emerged for an interview in which he disputed some accounts of the hunt, expressed agitation at the animosity directed at those close to him and said he would be back at work within days.

reuters Two Canadian Conservative election candidates dropped out after they were identified in embarrassing videos, including one who was caught on camera urinating into a coffee mug.

huffingtonpost.ca Jerry Bance, a former Conservative candidate who was caught by hidden cameras peeing into a mug on a CBC show three years ago, explained a ''health situation'' is to blame for his bad behavior.

independent.co.uk The shortest man in recorded history has died, three years after entering the Guinness world records and before which he had never left his village. Chandra Bahadur Dangi, a Nepalese man who stood 1ft 9in tall (54.6 cm), has passed away on the Polynesian island of Samoa after being ill with pneumonia.

telegraph.co.uk Ground-penetrating radar has found a large buried row of 90 standing stones which once stood five metres high, and formed a C-shaped arena that has not been seen for thousands of years. The stone line is likely to have marked a ritual procession route and is thought to date from the same time as nearby Stonehenge.

usatoday.com A Muslim flight attendant said the Atlanta-based airline ExpressJet suspended her for refusing to serve alcohol, a practice that is against her religious beliefs.



afp The Philippines deployed more than 100 special police to the capital's streets on Monday to try to ease a mammoth traffic problem said to be costing the country about US$53 million a day.



channelnewsasia.com Malaysia's sports minister has threatened to suspend the country's football body after last week's record 10-0 drubbing which has already prompted their coach to quit.



September 6-11 Asian Weightlifting Championships

Until September 12 Por Tor (Hungry Ghost) Festival

September Quicksilver surf carnival at Patong beach

October 15-23 Phuket Vegetarian Festival

November Patong Festival

November 20 Laguna Phuket Triathlon

November 25 Loy Kratong festival

November 29 Challenge Laguna Phuket 2015

November 29 Phuket King's Cup Regatta

December 5 HM The King's Birthday

December 26 Tsunami memorial ceremonies