Tourists warned of Thailand airport scam

Bangkok’s showcase new international airport is no stranger to controversy.

Built between 2002 and 2006, under the governments of then-Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, the opening date was repeatedly delayed.

It has been dogged by allegations of corruption, as well as criticism of the design and poor quality of construction.

Then, at the end of last year, the airport was shut down for a week after being occupied by anti-government protesters.

Now new allegations have been made that a number of passengers are being detained every month in the duty free area on suspicion of shoplifting, and then held by the police until they pay large sums of money to buy their freedom.

That is what happened to Stephen Ingram and Xi Lin, two IT experts from Cambridge, as they were about to board their flight to London on the night of 25 April this year.

They had been browsing in the duty free shop at the airport, and were later approached by security guards, who twice asked to search their bags.

Mr Ingram and Ms Xi were told they had to pay £7,500

They were told a wallet had gone missing, and that Ms Lin had been seen on a security camera taking it out of the shop.

The company that owns the duty free shop, King Power, has since put the CCTV video on its website, which does appear to show her putting something in her bag. However the security guards found no wallet on either of them.

Despite that, they were both taken from the departure gate, back through immigration, and held in an airport police office. That is when their ordeal started to become frightening.

Interpreter

“We were questioned in separate rooms,” Mr Ingram said. “We felt really intimidated. They went through our bags and demanded that we tell them where the wallet was.”

The two were then put in what Mr Ingram describes as a “hot, humid, smelly cell with graffiti and blood on the walls”.

Mr Ingram managed to phone a Foreign Office helpline he found in a travel guide, and was told someone in the Bangkok embassy would try to help them.

The next morning the two were given an interpreter, a Sri Lankan national called Tony, who works part-time for the police.

They were taken by Tony to meet the local police commander – but, says Mr Ingram, for three hours all they discussed was how much money they would have to pay to get out.

Mr Ingram and Ms Xi were taken to meet the local police commander

They were told the charge was very serious. If they did not pay, they would be transferred to the infamous Bangkok Hilton prison, and would have to wait two months for their case to be processed.

Mr Ingram says they wanted £7,500 ($12,250) – for that the police would try to get him back to the UK in time for his mother’s funeral on 28 April.

But he could not arrange to get that much money transferred in time.

‘Zig-zag’ scheme

Tony then took them to an ATM machine at the police station, and told Ms Lin to withdraw as much as she could from her own account – £600 – and Mr Ingram then withdrew the equivalent of £3,400 from his account.

This was apparently handed over to the police as “bail”, and they were both made to sign a number of papers.

Later they were allowed to move to a squalid hotel within the airport perimeter, but their passports were held and they were warned not to leave or try to contact a lawyer or their embassy.

“I will be watching you,” Tony told them, adding that they would have to stay there until the £7,500 was transferred into Tony’s account.

On the Monday they managed to sneak out and get a taxi to Bangkok, and met an official at the British Embassy.

She gave the name of a Thai lawyer, and, says Mr Ingram, told them they were being subjected to a classic Thai scam called the “zig-zag”.

Their lawyer urged them to expose Tony – but also warned them that if they fought the case it could take months, and they risked a long prison sentence.

After five days the money was transferred to Tony’s account, and they were allowed to leave.

Mr Ingram had missed his mother’s funeral, but at least they were given a court document stating that there was insufficient evidence against them, and no charge.

“It was a harrowing, stressful experience,” he said.

The couple say they now want to take legal action to recover their money.

‘Typical’ scam

The EXPRESS has spoken to Tony and the regional police commander, Colonel Teeradej Phanuphan.

They both say Tony was merely helping the couple with translation, and raising bail to keep them out of prison.

Tony says about half the £7,500 was for bail, while the rest were “fees” for the bail, for his work, and for a lawyer he says he consulted on their behalf.

In theory, he says, they could try to get the bail portion refunded.

Colonel Teeradej says he will investigate any possible irregularities in their treatment. But he said any arrangement between the couple and Tony was a private affair, which did not involve the police.

Letters of complaint to the papers here in Thailand make it clear that passengers are regularly detained at the airport for alleged shoplifting, and then made to pay middlemen to win their freedom.

The Danish Embassy says one of its nationals was recently subjected to a very similar scam, and earlier this month an Irish scientist managed to flee Thailand with her husband and one year-old son after being arrested at the airport and accused of stealing an eyeliner worth around £17.

Tony told the BBC that so far this year he has “helped” about 150 foreigners in trouble with the police. He says sometimes he does it for no charge.

The British Embassy has also warned passengers at Bangkok Airport to take care not to move items around in the duty free shopping area before paying for them, as this could result in arrest and imprisonment.

Worldwide survey seeks MS answers

Women are twice as likely as men to develop MS

A major new study that hopes to answer key questions about the neurological disease multiple sclerosis (MS) is being unveiled on Thursday.

This first worldwide study is the work of the WHO and the Multiple Sclerosis International Federation (MSIF).

It remains unclear what causes MS but the study says there may be many more sufferers than the estimated 1.3m.

Survey organizers urge governments to invest more in education and services to improve sufferers’ quality of life.

Specialist equipment

MS is a degenerative disease of the central nervous system. It typically emerges in young adults and can lead to severe disability.

Symptoms often include aching, loss of balance, muscle spasm and paralysis and general fatigue.

But there are still many mysteries surrounding MS.

It is not clear what causes it or why women are twice as likely as men to develop it. Or why it is so much more common in colder countries than warmer ones.

There must be many people out there who we just don’t know about Peer Baneke, MSIF

The study has found that although most cases occur in the developed world, every country that took part in the survey, rich or poor, had some instances.

Peer Baneke, the chief executive of the MSIF, says the rough estimate of 1.3m cases worldwide is probably a big underestimation.

“The diagnosis of multiple sclerosis is very difficult,” he said. “You really need neurologists who have the knowledge to distinguish it from other things.”

It also needs specialist equipment which poorer health systems simply cannot access. MRI scanners, for example, are in short supply in the developing world.

“There must be many people out there who we just don’t know about,” said Mr Baneke.

Stigma

The survey also looks at the experiences of people with MS. In many countries, they face stigma and misunderstanding.

Kanya Puspokusumo, a 36-year-old Indonesian, was diagnosed in 2001.

She said that some people thought MS was similar to Aids. Even though she explained it was not transmitted from one person to another, many still excluded her socially.

Dr Hithaishi Weerakoon is a doctor in Sri Lanka who was diagnosed with MS more than a decade ago.

Many families do not acknowledge MS, she says, and keep affected family members hidden away.

Others say, wrongly, that it has developed as a condition because of sins in a past life.

Those associated with the study say this is an important start – but that far more research needs to be done, especially in developing countries where the process of identifying cases systematically and collecting data is still at a very early stage.

Sri Lanka jets bomb ‘rebel base’

Jets are said to have carried out raids deep inside rebel-held territory

Sri Lanka’s military says its jets have bombed a Tamil Tiger intelligence center in the north, a day after a rebel air raid on a military base.

Fighter aircraft pounded the rebel center in the northern region of Kilinochchi, the defense ministry said.

Reports from the area confirm an air raid, injuring at least two people. The rebels said civilian homes were hit.

The attack came as UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon expressed deep concern over the increased hostilities in Sri Lanka.

On Monday, the government issued a notice to foreign aid workers to leave the rebel-held areas in the north saying it could not guarantee their safety. On Tuesday, UN officials said they would relocate staff.

The government says that it is on track to defeat the rebels.

Displaced

Officials said the area where the latest military operation was carried out is deep inside rebel-held territory.

“Taking on offensive raids into the LTTE [Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam] backyard, Sri Lanka air force fighter jets made precision air sorties at the LTTE’s main intelligence command and control centre located in Kilinochchi,” the defense ministry said.

The region also houses several non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and aid agencies. The UN said one of its vehicles was slightly damaged.

The Tamil Tigers said the air force had bombed a civilian settlement near Kilinochchi town centre, destroying 12 homes.

“No one was hurt because people sought safety in the bunkers,” a statement said.

Photographs on their website showed buildings they said were civilian houses damaged or destroyed by the bombing.

Hospital officials told a pregnant woman had been injured in the bombing. She lost her baby after a stone hit her abdomen during the raid. A child also fainted.

Rubble of civilian homes the Tigers say were hit in the raid

There is growing concern for the fate of civilians in the north after the government ordered aid agencies to leave Tamil Tiger controlled territory.

The UN secretary general said the fighting had “grave humanitarian consequences for civilians”.

“He reminds all concerned of their responsibility to take active steps to ensure the safety and freedom of movement of civilians, allowing humanitarian organizations to do their work in safety, as well as to reach persons affected by the fighting who need humanitarian assistance,” a statement said.

Human rights group Amnesty International called for international monitors to be allowed into the north to oversee convoys of aid and other essential supplies.

There are about 70 UN national and international workers in areas of the north controlled by the Tamil Tigers, the UN says. Most are based in the town of Kilinochchi.

Aid agencies say there are nearly 160,000 people in the Tiger-controlled north who have been displaced by the fighting.

The International Red Cross (ICRC) – one of the most prominent international agencies in the north – said that its teams were committed to remain in both rebel and government-held areas.

Offensive

But an ICRC spokesman said that situation was being monitored and negotiations were currently underway with the government in Colombo.

The UN says the plight of civilians in the north is worsening

Correspondents say that part of the problem for some aid agencies in the north is that their staff cannot leave because they are Tamil locals and the rebels will not issue them with passes.

The military meanwhile says that its offensive – aimed at crushing the rebels and ending their fight for a separate state for the Tamil minority – is on course.

The ministry of defence said that it shot down a rebel plane on Tuesday in a major incident in which 12 soldiers and a policemen were killed during a Tamil Tiger attack on a base in the northern area of Vavuniya.

The Tigers said 10 of their suicide fighters were killed in the raid.

They said that the raid was backed by artillery and light aircraft dropping bombs and that a radar station was destroyed in extensive damage to the base.

The Tamil Tigers have been fighting for a separate state for the Tamil minority in the north and east of Sri Lanka for 25 years.

More than 70,000 people have died.

S Lanka ‘shoots down rebel plane’

Sri Lanka’s air force has shot down a plane belonging to the rebel Tamil Tigers, military officials have said.

If confirmed, it would be the first rebel plane downed by the military.

The aircraft was intercepted by fighter jets after it and another rebel plane bombed a military airfield in the north of the island, the air force said.

A rebel artillery strike and ground assault on the air base killed 10 soldiers, 10 rebels and one policeman, the ministry of defense said.

The Tamil Tigers said they had no information that one of their planes was shot down.

The ministry of defence said 15 soldiers, five air force personnel and eight police were also wounded in the attack on the air base at Vavuniya, near the front line in north-eastern Sri Lanka.

Government offensive

The air force said the light aircraft used by the Tamil Tigers was shot down over thick jungle near Mullaittivu, in rebel-held territory.

The Tigers’ rudimentary air force began operations last year with a surprise attack on an air base on the outskirts of the capital, Colombo.

The Tamil Tiger aircraft have improvised bomb racks

The last successful rebel attack took place on the strategic eastern port of Trincomalee in August, when 10 sailors were wounded.

The Tamil Tigers have a number of small Czech-built, two-seater, propeller-driven Zlin-143 aircraft, which are operated from jungle airstrips.

They are thought to have been smuggled into the island in pieces, then reassembled and modified to carry bombs, our correspondent says.

The aerial battle comes as the government forces continue a major offensive against the rebels in northern areas of the island.

On Monday, the government ordered all aid workers out of the battle zone, saying it could not guarantee their safety.

The Tamil Tigers have been fighting for a separate state for the Tamil minority in the north and east of Sri Lanka for 25 years. More than 70,000 people have died.

Sri Lanka bars foreign aid staff

Tamils have been fleeing the fighting in the north and east of the island

Sri Lanka’s government has announced a ban on foreign aid workers and many of their local colleagues from working in Tamil-rebel held areas in the north.

Defense Secretary Gotabhaya Rajapaksa said Colombo could no longer guarantee the safety of aid workers in the area.

Colombo has intensified its war against the Tamil Tigers in a drive to crush their decades-old separatist struggle.

Aid agencies have been helping some of an estimated 160,000 people displaced by the fighting in the north.

They have in the past voiced concern for tens of thousands of people who have fled the frontline and sought refuge from the violence deep inside rebel-held territory.

The agencies have yet to respond to the government’s announcement.

An estimated 85,000 people have fled their homes in the area since June, according to the United Nations.

‘Dangerous environment’

The government said the ban would apply to all foreign aid workers in rebel-held territory and to their local colleagues who were not permanently resident in the area.

“We can’t assure the security of these people,” Defense Secretary Rajapaksa told The Associated Press news agency. “We are taking precautions.”

Mr Rajapaksa said any people affected by the ban who were currently in the area should leave immediately.

He said his government wished to avoid a repeat of the murder in 2006 of 17 local employees of French aid agency, Action Against Hunger.

Sri Lanka’s government said Tamil rebels carried out the attack but international truce monitors said the killings were the work of the military.

A United Nations official last year described Sri Lanka as one of the world’s most dangerous environments for humanitarian workers, prompting an angry rebuttal from the government.

The Tamil Tigers have been fighting for a separate homeland in the north and east for 25 years.

More than 70,000 people have died in the conflict.

Do you work for an NGO in northern Sri Lanka? Are you affected by this announcement? Send us your experiences.

‘Scores dead’ in S Lanka fighting

The Tigers have been waging a decades-old war against Colombo

Forty two Tamil Tiger rebels have been killed in fresh fighting with security forces in Sri Lanka, the military says.

Five soldiers were also killed in battles which took place on frontlines in the north of the island on Sunday.

The military has advanced rapidly into rebel-controlled territory to crush the rebels and end their fight for a separate state for the Tamil minority.

The Tamil Tigers have been fighting for a separate homeland in the north and east for 25 years.

More than 70,000 people have died in the fighting.

Sunday was a heavy day of fighting in northern Sri Lanka, according to the military’s spokesman Brig Udaya Nanayakkara.

He said soldiers were trying to inflict the maximum number of casualties on the Tamil Tigers.

Surge in fighting

The bloodiest battle of the day was in Vavuniya, he said, where 18 rebels were killed as well as one soldier.

In Kilinochchi district, troops captured 500 metres of the Tigers’ defences and killed another seven rebels. Three soldiers died there.

And in government-controlled Anuradhapura special forces troops killed what Brig Nanayakkara described as 10 rebels who were trying to infiltrate, with the loss of one soldier.

There were more confrontations in Mullaitivu, and Jaffna, also in the north.

The Tamil Tigers have not commented on the military’s claims – with journalists barred from the conflict zone they cannot be independently verified.

Fighting has intensified in Sri Lanka in recent months as soldiers have advanced, aiming to crush the rebels and win the war which began a generation ago.

Tens of thousands of people have fled further in Tiger-controlled areas.

Over the weekend the rebels said the military had fired a shell which killed five civilians in a makeshift camp, including two small children.

The military denied the accusation.

S Lankan army ‘takes rebel base’

The Tamil Tigers have seen a string of reverses this year

Sri Lanka’s military say they have captured a training complex of the Tamil Tiger rebel group, complete with 100 underground bunkers.

The government says its forces are now 15km (nine miles) from Kilinochchi, the rebels’ administrative hub.

There is concern over tens of thousands of people displaced by the fighting who are converging on the town.

In recent weeks, Sri Lankan troops have broken through the Tamil Tigers’ defenses in the north of the island.

They have taken control of towns, villages and bases.

On Saturday soldiers captured a rebel training complex in Welioya after Tiger fighters fled the area.

Military spokesman Brig Udaya Nanayakkara said it contained lecture halls as well as the bunkers.

Thousands flee

In fighting elsewhere across the north on Saturday, the military says 27 rebels and seven soldiers were killed.

Repeated attempts to contact the Tigers by phone and e-mail have gone unanswered in recent days.

Government officials have said they aim to defeat the rebels before the year is out and end the island’s 25-year civil war.

The United Nations estimates up to 75,000 people have fled the fighting since the start of June and many have converged on the town.

Cabinet Minister Keheliya Rambukwella said the forces were holding back in some areas while the government considered how to get the civilians out.

He accused the Tigers of using them as a human shield.

Relatively few civilians have crossed into government-controlled areas and last week Amnesty International alleged the government was putting those who have into what they called “de facto detention centres”.

Thousands flee homes in Sri Lanka

Courtesy BBC

By Roland Buerk BBC News, Colombo

People are leaving their village homes

Up to 75,000 people have fled their homes in northern Sri Lanka in the last two and a half months, the UN says.

This adds to huge numbers of people already displaced by years of war in the troubled island.

Government forces are advancing into territory controlled by the Tamil Tiger rebels, who want an independent state for the island’s ethnic Tamil minority.

The UN is calling for continued access to those who have been displaced to avoid a humanitarian crisis.

Military claims

Sri Lanka’s government does not allow journalists to go to the areas where the conflict is taking place.

But what is clear is that the military is now moving forward at a rapid pace.

People recently displaced are living in the open air under trees

For months the fighting in the north was taking place on largely static front lines. Now village after village, and rebel base after rebel base, according to the ministry of defence, is falling into government hands.

On Wednesday soldiers took control of Mulankavil, which the ministry of defence described as a Tamil Tiger garrison town.

It added that the forces were now within 15km of Kilinochchi town, the rebels’ administrative hub.

The UN says as many as a third of the entire population of the rebel areas have abandoned their homes since the start of June.

“I think a lot depends on what happens over the next few weeks,” said Neil Buhne, the UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator in Sri Lanka.

“If we are able to have continued access in terms of humanitarian supplies to these people, if there is safe space for the civilians in that area, if both sides respect their responsibility to allow displaced people to move where they want to move they I think a crisis can be avoided.”

Mr Buhne estimated between a quarter and half of the people recently displaced are living in the open air under trees.

Funerals

Sri Lanka’s government says it is on the brink of victory in a war that began a generation ago.

Last July it announced the Tigers had been driven from areas they controlled in the east of the island.

Provincial elections have since been held there.

Now the forces are advancing into the north.

It is impossible to get independent confirmation of the military’s progress, and the high casualties they claim to be inflicting on the rebels.

But people living in Tiger-held areas say large numbers of funerals are taking place, coffins draped in rebel flags carried on the back of pick up trucks to graveyards.

‘Liberation activity’

And they speak of a palpable slump in morale, even though the Tigers have reversed military advances in earlier phases of the war.

On their website the Tigers wrote that indiscriminate bombing and shelling is forcing people to leave their settlements.

And they issued an urgent call to people in areas they control to dig bunkers in their homes and workplaces.

“The [ethnic majority] Sinhala nation is intent on occupying and enslaving the Tamil homeland,” the rebels said in one statement.

“Our military is only involved in a war of self defence against this war of the Sinhala nation.”

Many Tamil civilians are trapped between the warring sides

But the government insists Tamils being displaced now will be better off if the rebels are defeated.

“We are on a liberation activity,” said Keheliya Rambukwella, the government’s defence spokesman.

“We will liberate the north, sooner than people even think. When you need to look at a bigger target, a bigger goal, you need to make certain sacrifices down the line. And these are the sacrifices and for these sacrifices we are not going to let them down.”

The government alleges the Tamil Tigers could be planning to use civilians in the north as human shields.

Very few have crossed into government-controlled areas, but the United Nations says there has no been no prevention of movement to keep them in Tiger-held territory.

The displaced people are converging on Kilinochchi likely to be a key battleground as Sri Lanka’s government continues to try to win the war.