theguardian.com A body recovered on Wednesday from the crashed AirAsia plane was wearing a life jacket, an official with Indonesia's search and rescue agency said, raising questions about how the disaster unfolded.

pulse.ng Jay Z and Beyonce went to a Muay Thai fight at the Patong Boxing Stadium where the couple sat ringside on Monday.

thepostonline.nl On their vacation on Phuket, Beyonce and Jay Z are paying $25,000 per night at the Amanpuri Resort. Jay Z was spotted on the beach where he built sandcastles for his daughter Blue Ivy.

AP Nine people, including seven adults and two young children, were found dead at three separate crime scenes in what Edmonton's police chief on Tuesday called a ''senseless mass murder.''


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



nationmultimedia.com A domestic flight of Thai AirAsia - and a long haul Bangkok-London flight of Thai Airways International - both made emergency landings due to technical problems.
http://www.nationmultimedia.com/national/Two-flights-report-problems-turn-back-to-Bangkok-30251020.html

reuters Malaysia, southern Thailand and parts of the Philippines have been battered by heavy rain and flash floods in recent days, killing dozens of people, officials said.



bbc.com Recovery teams are launching a ''massive search'' in the Java Sea for victims of the AirAsia flight QZ8501 crash, as investigators look for the plane's crucial data recorders.

smh.com.au AirAsia CEO Tony Fernandes whose plane crashed on Sunday killing 155 passengers and seven crew has told Indonesian President Joko Widodo he believes the blame can be put squarely on bad weather. While saying it would be ''improper'' to speculate on a cause, Mr Fernandes said he had spoken with the Indonesian President ''about some of the information that we [AirAsia] have about what could have gone wrong''.

independent.co.uk The pilot who discovered the debris from AirAsia Flight QZ8501 has said he saw that three of the bodies recovered were holding hands.

bbc.com AirAsia previously had an excellent safety record and there were no fatal accidents involving its aircraft.



voanews.com In a resolution passed by consensus, the UN General Assembly expressed ''serious concern'' at Myanmar's treatment of the mostly Muslim Rohingya minority group. Around 140,000 Rohingya are stuck in filthy, overcrowded camps in Rakhine state, where sectarian unrest has left up to 280 people dead in since June 2012.

aljazeera.com The 1.3 million Rohingya have been denied citizenship under national law and are effectively stateless and have almost no rights. Burmese authorities want to officially categorise them as ''Bengalis,'' implying they are illegal migrants from neighboring Bangladesh.



bbc.com Nurse Pauline Cafferkey, who is battling Ebola at a London hospital, could be offered plasma from patients who have survived the virus. The treatment contains antibodies that should help fight the infection.



Phuket Update Phuket environmentalists are not optimistic about the National Reform Council's vote to seriously push Thailand's Andaman coast to become a World Heritage site for conservation and tourism. Much of the coast has already been destroyed by development, uncontrolled tourism and overfishing, they say.

Phuket Update Police are investigating the murder of Patchara Tipneth, 18, who was riding pillion a motorcycle in Poonpol Road, near the Slaughterhouse Intersection when shot in the back in Phuket City about 11.50pm on Monday. No motive is apparent for the killing so far.

onegreenplanet.org The baby elephant that singer Beyonce has so happily perched herself upon on Phuket was likely taken from his mother and forced to endure a six-month ''breaking'' period, during which time he was locked in a small enclosure and continuously beaten by his mahouts (trainers).

scmp.com A Chinese businessman who bought and ate three tigers has been sentenced to 13 years in prison, state media reported.

wsj.com The US carried out an airstrike in Somalia targeting what it called a ''leader'' of the Islamist terrorist group al-Shabaab, the Pentagon said in a statement.

nytimes.com In a controversial decision, the BBC has postponed the scheduled broadcast of a documentary about how the royal family hired a public-relations professional to restore the reputation of Prince Charles after the 1997 death of Diana, Princess of Wales, and to help integrate into the royal household his then-lover, Camilla Parker Bowles, whom he later married, and who is now the Duchess of Cornwall.

digitalspy.co.uk 'Reinventing the Royals' has had its transmission postponed after an intervention by lawyers representing senior members of the royal family, Radio Times reports.

bangkokpost.com Check out 15 top shots taken by Bangkok Post photographers this year and learn how each photo is captured even before the shutter is pressed.
http://bangkokpost.com/multimedia/interactive/453103/the-stories-behind-the-photos

bbc.com A woman in the US state of Idaho has been killed after her two-year-old son accidentally shot her with a gun he found when reaching into her handbag.

scmp.com The Hong Kong government will kill all the 15,000 live poultry in a wholesale market in Cheung Sha Wan and close the market off for 21 days after samples of chicken imported from the mainland tested positive of H7N9 bird flu virus.

AP Italian authorities sent two helicopters to meet a cargo ship believed to be carrying hundreds of migrants after a passenger sent a distress call earlier when the ship was off Greece.

afp Bangladesh's war crimes court sentenced leading Islamist A.T.M. Azharul Islam to death for rape, mass murder and genocide during the country's 1971 war of independence from Pakistan. He stood accused of the genocide of more than 1200 people in a flood plain in the northern district of Rangpur.

independent.co.uk The former wife of Stephen Hawking has described how she and their three children were ''left behind'' after the cosmologist was surrounded by ''sycophantic'' admirers following publication of his landmark work A Brief History of Time.

smh.com.au Australia's customs officers will be armed at airports in the new year, the Immigration Minister Peter Dutton has announced as he cements his plan to crack down on crime gangs and drug traffickers in his new portfolio.

theage.com.au By using Uber, I'm breaking the law. But it gets me home on time.

boredpanda.com Beth Moon, a photographer based in San Francisco, has been searching for the world's oldest trees for the past 14 years. She has traveled all around the globe to capture the most magnificent trees that grow in remote locations and look as old as the world itself.
http://www.boredpanda.com/ancient-tree-photography-beth-moon/



thejakartapost.com A number of hotels in Bali's popular tourist spots have seen all their rooms booked for the year-end holiday as domestic and foreign visitors flock to the resort island to celebrate the New Year.

smh.com.au With the eyes of the world watching Indonesia during the search for the missing AirAsia plane, the country's attorney-general has quietly delayed plans to execute five or six prisoners before the new year.

nationmultimedia.com Three aviation tragedies involving carriers from Asean within a space of nine months will not stop the implementation of the Asean open skies policy that will kick off from January 1. The policy, however, is expected to pay more attention to having higher standards of safety and other regulatory approvals to operate flights, among others, when it is fully implemented by the end of 2015.



reuters Chelsea will begin 2015 protecting a three-point lead in the Premier League title race but will heed the words of their grand old striker Didier Drogba who warns that it is simply not enough.

bbc.com India captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni has retired from Test cricket. The 33-year-old, who made his debut in 2005 and was captain for 60 of his 90 Tests, quit after India drew the third Test against Australia.

smh.com.au Australia reclaimed the Border-Gavaskar trophy as a hostile Boxing Day Test with India ended in a draw.



The ''Colorful Countdown Phuket 2015'' will usher in the New Year with light shows and live concerts at Sanam Chai Park, across the road from Phuket Provincial Hall, from December 29-31.

Phuket International Boat Show returns to southern Thailand's beach destination from January 8 to 11.

December 29-31 Colorful Countdown Phuket 2015 to New Year's Eve



January 6-11 Phuket International Boat Show

January 21 Australian embassy outreach to Phuket Call 02-3446300, e: consular.bangkok@dfat.gov.au

February 12-15 Phuket Yacht Show