Thai Tourist Police arrested Ndubuisi, 34, a Nigerian suspect who was the subject of an arrest warrant issued by the Samut Prakan Provincial Court for 4 counts of violating the law: 1. defrauding the public by impersonating another person, 2. entering false information into the computer system, 3. criminal enrichment and 4. money laundering. Police arrested him at a housing property in Pattaya, Chon Buri.
Pol. Lt. Col. Prin Sripattarakulchai, the head of the arrest team, said the suspect was one of the romance scammers whose behaviour consisted of creating a Facebook account under another person’s identity to try to get close to a female victim.
These scammers tried to lure the victim by saying that they would get married and live together in Thailand. The scammers pretend to send some high-value items as an engagement gift. They work with Thai scammers to pose as customs officials and ask the victim to pay a fee before they receive the gift. The Thai female victim was scammed out of up to THB 300,000.
The investigation team applied for an arrest warrant at the Samut Prakan Provincial Court before discovering that the suspect was hiding in a Pattaya housing estate. The team ambushed the suspect near the house and arrested him before handing him over to the interrogator at Bang Sao Thong Police Station for further prosecution and to extend the arrest to other fraudsters.
Thailand continues to be listed as “not free” by US-based NGO Freedom House in its latest annual report released on March 9. It received one point increase due to Bangkok gubernatorial election last year, however.
It’s political rights score was rated at 6 out of 40, citizens’ freedom at 24 out of the score of 40 – or 30 out of 100 in total.
“Following five years of military dictatorship, Thailand transitioned to a military-dominated, semi-elected government in 2019. The combination of democratic deterioration and frustrations over the role of the monarchy in Thailand’s governance triggered massive demonstrations in 2020 and 2021.
In response, the regime has employed authoritarian tactics, including arbitrary arrests, intimidation, lèse-majesté charges, and harassment of activists,” Freedom House stated.
FILE – Inflatable yellow ducks, which have become good-humored symbols of resistance during anti-government rallies, are lifted over a crowd of protesters in Bangkok, Thailand, Nov. 27, 2020. (AP Photo/Sakchai Lalit, File)
The 2023 edition of Freedom in the World is the 50th in this series of annual comparative reports. It is noted the Key Findings:
Global freedom declined for the 17th consecutive year. Moscow’s war of aggression led to devastating human rights atrocities in Ukraine. New coups and other attempts to undermine representative government destabilized Burkina Faso, Tunisia, Peru, and Brazil.
Previous years’ coups and ongoing repression continued to diminish basic liberties in Guinea and constrain those in Turkey, Myanmar, and Thailand, among others. Two countries suffered downgrades in their overall freedom status: Peru moved from Free to Partly Free, and Burkina Faso moved from Partly Free to Not Free.
The struggle for democracy may be approaching a turning point. The gap between the number of countries that registered overall improvements in political rights and civil liberties and those that registered overall declines for 2022 was the narrowest it has ever been through 17 years of global deterioration.
Thirty-four countries made improvements, and the tally of countries with declines, at 35, was the smallest recorded since the negative pattern began. The gains were driven by more competitive elections as well as a rollback of pandemic-related restrictions that had disproportionately affected freedom of assembly and freedom of movement. Two countries, Colombia and Lesotho, earned upgrades in their overall freedom status, moving from Partly Free to Free.
While authoritarians remain extremely dangerous, they are not unbeatable. The year’s events showed that autocrats are far from infallible, and their errors provide openings for democratic forces. The effects of corruption and a focus on political control at the expense of competence exposed the limits of the authoritarian models offered by Beijing, Moscow, Caracas, or Tehran. Meanwhile, democratic alliances demonstrated solidarity and vigor.
Infringement on freedom of expression has long been a key driver of global democratic decline. Over the last 17 years, the number of countries and territories that receive a score of 0 out of 4 on the report’s media freedom indicator has ballooned from 14 to 33, as journalists face persistent attacks from autocrats and their supporters while receiving inadequate protection from intimidation and violence even in some democracies.
The fight for freedom persists across decades. When Freedom House issued the first edition of its global survey in 1973, 44 of 148 countries were rated Free. Today, 84 of 195 countries are Free.
Over the past 50 years, consolidated democracies have not only emerged from deeply repressive environments but also proven to be remarkably resilient in the face of new challenges. Although democratization has slowed and encountered setbacks, ordinary people around the world, including in Iran, China, and Cuba, continue to defend their rights against authoritarian encroachment.
FILE - Grey clouds cover the sky over a building of the Credit Suisse bank in Zurich, Switzerland, on Feb. 21, 2022. (Ennio Leanza/Keystone via AP, File)
GENEVA (AP) — Swiss bank Credit Suisse said Thursday it will move to shore up its finances, borrowing up to $54 billion from the central bank after its shares plunged, dragging down other major European lenders in the wake of bank failures in the United States.
Credit Suisse said would exercise an option to borrow up to 50 billion francs ($53.7 billion) from the central bank.
“This additional liquidity would support Credit Suisse’s core businesses and clients as Credit Suisse takes the necessary steps to create a simpler and more focused bank built around client needs,” the bank said.
Fanning new fears about the health of financial institutions following the recent collapse of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank in the U.S., at one point, Credit Suisse shares lost more than a quarter of their value on Wednesday.
The share price hit a record low after the bank’s biggest shareholder — the Saudi National Bank — told news outlets that it would not put more money into the Swiss lender, which was beset by problems long before the U.S. banks collapsed. The Saudi bank is seeking to avoid regulations that kick in with a stake above 10%, having invested some 1.5 billion Swiss francs to acquire a holding just under that threshold.
A sign displays the name of Credit Suisse on the floor at the New York Stock Exchange in New York, Wednesday, March 15, 2023. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig)
The turmoil prompted an automatic pause in trading of Credit Suisse shares on the Swiss market and sent shares of other European banks tumbling, some by double digits.
Speaking Wednesday at a financial conference in the Saudi capital of Riyadh, Credit Suisse Chairman Axel Lehmann defended the bank, saying, “We already took the medicine” to reduce risks.
When asked if he would rule out government assistance in the future, he said: “That’s not a topic. … We are regulated. We have strong capital ratios, very strong balance sheet. We are all hands on deck, so that’s not a topic whatsoever.”
Switzerland’s central bank announced late Wednesday that it was prepared to act, saying it would support Credit Suisse if needed. A statement from the bank did not specify whether the support would come in the form of cash or loans or other assistance. The regulators said they believed the bank had enough money to meet its obligations.
Possibility of more hidden troubles
A day earlier, Credit Suisse reported that managers had identified “material weaknesses” in the bank’s internal controls on financial reporting as of the end of last year. That fanned new doubts about the bank’s ability to weather the storm.
Credit Suisse stock dropped about 30%, to about 1.6 Swiss francs ($1.73), before clawing back to a 24% loss at 1.70 francs ($1.83) at the close of trading on the SIX stock exchange. At its lowest, the price was down more than 85% from February 2021.
After the joint announcement from the Swiss National Bank and the Swiss financial markets regulator, the shares also made up some ground on Wall Street.
The stock has suffered a long, sustained decline: In 2007, the bank’s shares traded at more than 80 francs ($86.71) each.
With concerns about the possibility of more hidden trouble in the banking system, investors were quick to sell bank stocks.
FILE – The logo at a building of the Credit Suisse bank in Zurich, Switzerland, on Nov. 23, 2022. (Michael Buholzer/Keystone via AP)
A day earlier, Credit Suisse reported that managers had identified “material weaknesses” in the bank’s internal controls on financial reporting as of the end of last year. That fanned new doubts about the bank’s ability to weather the storm.
Credit Suisse stock dropped about 30%, to about 1.6 Swiss francs ($1.73), before clawing back to a 24% loss at 1.70 francs ($1.83) at the close of trading on the SIX stock exchange. At its lowest, the price was down more than 85% from February 2021.
After the joint announcement from the Swiss National Bank and the Swiss financial markets regulator, the shares also made up some ground on Wall Street.
The stock has suffered a long, sustained decline: In 2007, the bank’s shares traded at more than 80 francs ($86.71) each.
With concerns about the possibility of more hidden trouble in the banking system, investors were quick to sell bank stocks.
France’s Societe Generale SA dropped 12% at one point. France’s BNP Paribas fell more than 10%. Germany’s Deutsche Bank tumbled 8%, and Britain’s Barclays Bank was down nearly 8%. Trading in the two French banks was briefly suspended.
The STOXX Banks index of 21 leading European lenders sagged 8.4% following relative calm in the markets Tuesday.
Asian stocks fall after Wall St sinks
Asian stock markets tumbled Thursday after Wall Street sank as a plunge in Credit Suisse shares reignited worries about a possible bank crisis following the failure of two U.S. lenders.
Shanghai, Tokyo, Hong Kong and Sydney all dropped, reversing Wednesday’s gains. Oil prices edged higher.
Wall Street’s benchmark S&P 500 lost 0.7% on Wednesday after being down as much as 2.1% at one point following a 30% plunge in Credit Suisse’s share price. That fueled jitters about the strength of global banks that are under strain from interest rate hikes to cool inflation.
The Credit Suisse fall “shakes already fragile investor sentiment,” said Venkateswaran Lavanya of Mizuho Bank in a report.
Major banks in Asia were hit by heavy selling. Shares in Japan’s Mizuho Bank were down 3.9& while Resona Holdings, Japan’s No. 5 bank, fell 4.8%. In Hong Kong, Standard Chartered Plc lost 2.5% and HSBC was 2.5% lower.
The Shanghai Composite Index lost 0.4% to 3,250.63 after government data Wednesday showed the Chinese economy is recovering more slowly than expected following the lifting of anti-virus controls.
The Nikkei 225 in Tokyo retreated 0.9% to 26,974.39 and the Hang Seng in Hong Kong shed 1.3% to 19,297.81.
The Kospi in Seoul was 0.2% lower at 2,375.12 and Sydney’s S&P-ASX 200 sank 1.5% to 6,964.80.
Not just a Swiss problem
The turbulence came a day ahead of a meeting by the European Central Bank. President Christine Lagarde said last week, before the U.S. failures, that the bank would “very likely” increase interest rates by a half percentage point to fight against inflation. Markets were watching closely to see if the bank carries through despite the latest turmoil.
Credit Suisse is “a much bigger concern for the global economy” than the midsize U.S. banks that collapsed, said Andrew Kenningham, chief Europe economist for Capital Economics.
It has multiple subsidiaries outside Switzerland and handles trading for hedge funds.
“Credit Suisse is not just a Swiss problem but a global one,” he said.
He noted, however, that the bank’s “problems were well known so do not come as a complete shock to either investors or policymakers.”
The troubles “once more raise the question about whether this is the beginning of a global crisis or just another ‘idiosyncratic’ case,” Kenningham said in a note. ”Credit Suisse was widely seen as the weakest link among Europe’s large banks, but it is not the only bank which has struggled with weak profitability in recent years.”
International rules
The Credit Suisse parent bank is not part of EU supervision, but it has entities in several European countries that are. Credit Suisse is subject to international rules requiring it to maintain financial buffers against losses as one of 30 so-called globally systemically important banks, or G-SIBs.
Share prices plunged after Saudi National Bank Chairman Ammar Al Khudairy told Bloomberg and Reuters that the bank has ruled out further investments in Credit Suisse to avoid regulations that kick in with a stake above 10%.
In an annual report released Tuesday, Credit Suisse said customer deposits fell 41%, or by 159.6 billion francs ($172.1 billion), at the end of last year compared with a year earlier.
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McHugh reported from Frankfurt, Germany. Associated Press writers Joseph Krauss in Ottawa, Ontario, and Angela Charlton in Paris also contributed.
FILE - Lindsay Lohan appears the Christian Siriano Fall/Winter 2023 fashion show in New York on Feb. 9, 2023. (Photo by Charles Sykes/Invision/AP, File)
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Lindsay Lohan is expecting her first child.
The “Mean Girls” star announced her pregnancy in an Instagram post on Tuesday, sharing an image of a baby onesie with “Coming soon…” written on it. The post was captioned “We are blessed and excited!”
Lohan married financier Bader Shammas in 2022, People magazine reported.
A message sent to Lohan’s representative was not immediately returned.
The 36-year-old actor, who was once a tabloid mainstay, has lived overseas for several years and kept a lower public profile.
She recently returned to acting, starring in Netflix’s “Falling for Christmas” last year, and stars in the streaming service’s upcoming romantic comedy “Irish Wish.”
Lyu Bin (L) of China and Yutthana Kaensa of Thailand face off during the weigh-in prior to a WBA super flyweight fight to be held in Yongkang, east China's Zhejiang Province, March 15, 2023. (Xinhua/Hou Zhaokang)
Chinese boxer Lyu Bin is set to fight Yutthana Kaensa of Thailand for the WBA International Super Flyweight Championship in his hometown of Yongkang, east China’s Zhejiang Province.
YONGKANG, China, March 15 (Xinhua) — Lyu Bin, who boxed for China at the 2016 Rio Olympic Games, is set to fight Yutthana Kaensa of Thailand for the WBA International Super Flyweight Championship in his hometown on Thursday.
“I’ve been waiting for my chance,” Lyu told Xinhua. “Now the time has come.”
Lyu, 28, was known for his tearful defeat in the men’s 49kg division at Rio 2016.
“What doesn’t kill me makes me stronger,” he said.
Despite falling short of his Olympic dream, Lyu proved himself by claiming the national title in 2016 and then turned pro two years later.
Lyu, a native of Yongkang in east China’s Zhejiang Province, has spent months in China’s southwestern city of Kunming ahead of the upcoming WBA title bout, his first competitive fight in nearly five years.
“I’ve got a better grasp on speed and timing and have improved my punching technique a lot these years,” he said.
Apart from arduous training, Lyu has struggled to maintain his weight at around 52kg – running 10km every morning and engaging in special training for two hours in the afternoon, and eating a high-protein, low-carbon diet every day for the past five years.
“It’s absolute torture,” he admitted.
“The hunger for food was huge, but my hunger for victory is even bigger.
“To do what I love is a real blessing for me. I feel like the second spring of my career has come,” Lyu said.
Kaensa, 25, is an experienced name in Thailand’s professional boxing circuit and has a record of 24-4, with three defeats in his last five fights.
FILE - Text from the ChatGPT page of the OpenAI website is shown in this photo, in New York, Feb. 2, 2023. (AP Photo/Richard Drew, File)
LONDON (AP) — The company behind the ChatGPT chatbot has rolled out its latest artificial intelligence model, GPT-4, in the next step for a technology that’s caught the world’s attention.
The new system can figure out tax deductions and answer questions like a Shakespearan pirate, for example, but it still “hallucinates” facts and makes reasoning errors.
Here’s a look at San Francisco-based startup OpenAI’s latest improvement on the generative AI models that can spit out readable text and unique images:
WHAT’S NEW?
OpenAI says GPT-4 “exhibits human-level performance.” It’s much more reliable, creative and can handle “more nuanced instructions” than its predecessor system, GPT-3.5, which ChatGPT was built on, OpenAI said in its announcement.
In an online demo Tuesday, OpenAI President Greg Brockman ran through some scenarios that showed off GPT-4’s capabilities that appeared to show it’s a radical improvement on previous versions.
He demonstrated how the system could quickly come up with the proper income tax deduction after being fed reams of tax code — something he couldn’t figure himself.
“It’s not perfect, but neither are you. And together it’s this amplifying tool that lets you just reach new heights,” Brockman said.
It’s part of a new generation of machine-learning systems that can converse, generate readable text on demand and produce novel images and video based on what they’ve learned from a vast database of digital books and online text.
These new AI breakthroughs have the potential to transform the internet search business long dominated by Google, which is trying to catch up with its own AI chatbot, and numerous professions.
“With GPT-4, we are one step closer to life imitating art,” said Mirella Lapata, professor of natural language processing at the University of Edinburgh. She referred to the TV show “Black Mirror,” which focuses on the dark side of technology.
“Humans are not fooled by the AI in ‘Black Mirror’ but they tolerate it,” Lapata said. “Likewise, GPT-4 is not perfect, but paves the way for AI being used as a commodity tool on a daily basis.”
WHAT EXACTLY ARE THE IMPROVEMENTS?
GPT-4 is a “large multimodal model,” which means it can be fed both text and images that it uses to come up with answers.
In one example posted on OpenAI’s website, GPT-4 is asked, “What is unusual about this image?” It’s answer: “The unusual thing about this image is that a man is ironing clothes on an ironing board attached to the roof of a moving taxi.”
GPT-4 is also “steerable,” which means that instead of getting an answer in ChatGPT’s “classic” fixed tone and verbosity, users can customize it by asking for responses in the style of a Shakespearean pirate, for instance.
In his demo, Brockman asked both GPT-3.5 and GPT-4 to summarize in one sentence an article explaining the difference between the two systems. The catch was that every word had to start with the letter G.
GPT-3.5 didn’t even try, spitting out a normal sentence. The newer version swiftly responded: “GPT-4 generates groundbreaking, grandiose gains, greatly galvanizing generalized AI goals.”
HOW WELL DOES IT WORK?
ChatGPT can write silly poems and songs or quickly explain just about anything found on the internet. It also gained notoriety for results that could be way off, such as confidently providing a detailed but false account of the Super Bowl game days before it took place, or even being disparaging to users.
OpenAI acknowledged that GPT-4 still has limitations and warned users to be careful. GPT-4 is “still not fully reliable” because it “hallucinates” facts and makes reasoning errors, it said.
“Great care should be taken when using language model outputs, particularly in high-stakes contexts,” the company said, though it added that hallucinations have been sharply reduced.
Experts also advised caution.
“We should remember that language models such as GPT-4 do not think in a human-like way, and we should not be misled by their fluency with language,” said Nello Cristianini, professor of artificial intelligence at the University of Bath.
Another problem is that GPT-4 does not know much about anything that happened after September 2021, because that was the cutoff date for the data it was trained on.
ARE THERE SAFEGUARDS?
OpenAI says GPT-4’s improved capabilities “lead to new risk surfaces” so it has improved safety by training it to refuse requests for sensitive or “disallowed” information.
It’s less likely to answer questions on, for example, how to build a bomb or buy cheap cigarettes.
Still, OpenAI cautions that while “eliciting bad behavior” from GPT is harder, “doing so is still possible.”
Eight parties presented their economic policies to attract more money to Thailand, on Matichon Forum.
Before Parliament is dissolved and the 2023 Thai election campaign begins, the long-established newspaper Matichon and its sister companies hosted a political debate attended by the prime minister’s top candidates and party leaders from 8 parties on March 13, 2023. They all came with the aim of clarifying issues in politics and economics.
Prachachat Business has collected all the important economic policies from 8 political parties:
Democrat Party on increasing THB 300bn on SMEs
Democratic Party Policy Director Pisit Leeahtam opened the first-panel discussion with the topics of creative industries and soft power. He said Thailand could attract more tourists to the country, which is an important source of revenue for the country, boost employment and increase tourism revenue to THB 2 trillion.
He stressed the need for the country to revive tourism and help hotel businesses that have suffered losses. The Democratic Party’s Director of Policy said the party would increase support funds to THB 300 billion to create soft power and bring money into the country.
Also, Democrat Party will start a local bank with THB 2 million fund to boost the local economy.
From left above; Pisit Leeahtam, Sonthirat Sonthijirawong,, Anutin Charnvirakul, Prommin Lertsuridej / from left below; Santi Kiranand, Sirikanya Tansakun, Suwat Liptapanlop and Suphan Mongkolsuthi.
PPRP on 5 soft-powers
Sonthirat Sonthijirawong, Political Policy Director of the Palang Pracharath Party (PPRP), said that the heart of soft power lies in cultural capital. He explained that the most important Thai cultural capital is 1. bringing Thai food to the world market 2. enriching culture and traditions through festivals 3. making the country a cultural fashion centre, 4. improving the film and cinema industry and 5. promoting Thai boxing (Muay Thai)
Sonthirat Sonthijirawong
Sonthirat added that Thailand can compete with other countries in the service sector. However, there are 3 important transitional measures that need to be implemented: clearer policies, better budgeting and better cooperation between the private sector and the government.
Bhumjaithai on universal healthcare
Bhumjaithai Party leader Anutin Charnvirakul stressed the need to reduce inequality between the rich and the poor, large corporations and small businesses. He stressed that the government must take more care of the citizens and that everyone should be equal.
The party plans to continue and develop the so-called ’30 Baht Universal Healthcare’ program by providing access to more people in each province and adding more diseases and treatments to the programme, such as cancer, radiotherapy, dialysis and hemodialysis.
Anutin Charnvirakul
With regard to education, Anutin proposed that his government if elected will provide an interest-free loan without guarantors. He will adjust the law to make it fair to the people.
He said he was confident, given the country’s reputation, that the government could find a soft loan. This would allow state-owned enterprises to seek fewer profits and return them to the public.
Phue Thai Party to triple agriculture income in 4 years
Prommin Lertsuridej, director of the Phue Thai Party for Politics and Economy, said that the Thai economy has experienced a recession in the last 8 years and has lagged behind. He added that the government must tackle the root of the problem by first helping low-income citizens while strengthening the country’s economy.
According to a study by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), if the economy of the 20 percent richest class grows by 1 percentage point, total economic growth will fall by 0.8 percentage points. In contrast, if the country strengthens the economy of the bottom 20 percent of society, GDP will increase by 0.48 percentage points, a 7-fold difference in overall economic growth.
The Phue Thai Party insisted on its all-encompassing policy-making. Short-term measures aim to revive tourism to attract foreign money, increase revenue from agriculture, which accounted for 8 percent of GDP within 4 years, improve marketing and financing for small and medium enterprises, increase productivity and create a life-long learning environment through the use of advanced technology.
Move Forward and Chartthaipattana focus on raising wages
Santi Kiranand, the Chartthaipattana Strategic Committee, said his party was not only focusing on increasing the minimum wage but also on skilling and retraining the labour force within the entire economic system.
He suggested that the government should use tax incentives to attract the private sector and focus on the skills of informal workers, as well as the education system.
Sirikanya Tansakun, deputy leader in the policy of the Future Forward Party, said the party will aim to increase the minimum wage to 450 THB per day and increase the wage every year, taking into account inflation and GDP.
Sirikanya Tansakun
“Our party will systematically raise wages every year to end the wage policy campaign and strengthen the bargaining power of all workers. [The party] will make a rule for upskilling and career change through online training,” Sirikanya said.
The party will help small and medium enterprises with wage increases by allowing them to stop paying for workers’ social security for 6 months, and they can reduce the 2-times tax on wages.
Suwat: new THB 5trn economy
Chart Pattana Kla Party Leader Suwat Liptapanlop revealed the party plan to increase more money to the country during high spending periods. He promised the new THB 5 trillion economy.
In his opinion, the fastest way to generate revenue is through tourism. In the next 4 years, he said, he wants to double the current record, double the number of tourists from 40 million to 70 million, increase the length of stay from 10 to 12 days, and increase spending from THB 5,000 to THB 6,000. If you add up all the figures of 70 million tourists to 12 days stay and 6,000 THB per day, you get a turnover of THB 5 trillion.
Suwat Liptapanlop
Suwat emphasised the 5-Fs soft power economy through film, fighting [boxing], fashion, food and festival. He also mentioned the improvement of agribusiness, which could create several million jobs and higher income.
He also planned to reduce costs through changes in the energy structure to reduce the cost of oil, gas, electricity, refinery margin (spread), marketing and the cost of renewable energy. He also mentioned the new tax regime whereby people earning up to THB 40,000 will be exempt from income tax.
Cancelled 1,400 laws to benefit businesses
Suphan Mongkolsuthi, deputy party leader and head of economic policy of the Thai Sang Thai Party, said the party aims to create scope for small businesses to increase the country’s income.
He insisted that the government must help smaller businesses through the Thailand Board of Investment (BOI). Suphan said small businesses deserve their own branch where there is a one-stop service to help them expand in the export industry to bring money into the real economy and financial markets.
Suphan Mongkolsuthi
Suphan said that there are several ways to increase the country’s revenue. For exports, it would be better if the country helped create tens of thousands of small businesses. He said Thailand needs to focus on the country’s strengths in agriculture and tourism and use the Ta system to support them. In addition, the private sector and the government need to work together.
“There are more than 1,400 laws that hinder the business. [We] need to halt these laws.”
Rescue workers transport the wounded gunman to hospital on Mar. 15, 2023.
Update: Police said Kitikarn died at hospital on Wednesday night.
BANGKOK — Police said a disgruntled police officer who fired multiple shots in a residential area north of Bangkok was arrested Wednesday afternoon after an overnight standoff. He later died of injuries at hospital.
The lengthy standoff, which lasted for more than 24 hours, ended when police commandos decided to raid a house on Soi Jiramakron in Sai Mai district where the gunman, identified as Pol. Lt. Col. Kitikarn Sangbun, 51, an inspector with the Special Branch Police’s intelligence unit, was hiding. Kitikarn was reportedly shot during the firefight and taken to hospital.
No one, except for the Kitikarn, was injured in the incident, police said. He later died at Bhumibol Adulyadej Hospital on the same evening, Sai Mai police superintendent Rangsan Sornsing said Wednesday.
The gunman, who has a history of mental illness, went into hiding in his house on Tuesday morning after he opened fire on his colleagues who attempted to take him to hospital to treat his condition. His colleagues came to visit him with an ambulance after he did not report for duty for days, Pol. Col. Rangsan said Tuesday.
After driving his colleagues away, Kitikarn decided to lock himself up in the house and refused to surrender. He also fired multiple salvos throughout the day as police negotiators attempted to calm him down.
Police had said earlier they would not use lethal force since the gunman was not taking any hostages or targeting any individuals, though a bullet did lodge in a helmet of one of the police commandos.
Picture shot from drone; police gunman was inside the house.
“There is no need for violence” deputy police commissioner Torsak Sukvimol, who supervised the operation, said Tuesday. “Please allow more time for us to work and wait for this police officer to calm down.”
Various tactics were used to subdue the gunman, who was trained in counter-terrorism, from using his relatives and superiors as negotiators, using his colleagues to sing his favorite songs through a megaphone, to firing tear gas into his house, but only with limited success.
National police commissioner Damrongsak Kittiprapas said Wednesday he would consider discharging Kitikarn from service as he is no longer fit for duty. He also apologized to civilians who were affected by the incident.
“We must work carefully to prevent any loss on both sides,” Pol. Gen. Damrongsak said. “The police will compensate affected civilians or any damages to their homes.”
The star Wolf-Rayet 124, center, captured by the James Webb Space Telescope. (NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, Webb ERO Production Team via AP)
The Webb Space Telescope has captured the rare and fleeting phase of a star on the cusp of death.
NASA released the picture Tuesday at the South by Southwest conference in Austin, Texas.
The observation was among the first made by Webb following its launch in late 2021. Its infrared eyes observed all the gas and dust flung into space by a huge, hot star 15,000 light-years away. A light-year is about 5.8 trillion miles.
Shimmering in purple like a cherry blossom, the cast-off material once comprised the star’s outer layer. The Hubble Space Telescope snapped a shot of the same transitioning star a few decades ago, but it appeared more like a fireball without the delicate details.
Such a transformation occurs only with some stars and normally is the last step before they explode, going supernova, according to scientists.
This Hubble image shows the nebula M1-67 around the Wolf-Rayet star WR 124. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / Judy Schmidt, geckzilla.com.
“We’ve never seen it like that before. It’s really exciting,” said Macarena Garcia Marin, a European Space Agency scientist who is part of the project.
This star in the constellation Sagittarius, officially known as WR 124, is 30 times as massive as our sun and already has shed enough material to account for 10 suns, according to NASA.
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By MARCIA DUNN AP Aerospace Writer
The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
FILE - A U.S. MQ-9 drone is on display during an air show at Kandahar Airfield, Afghanistan, Tuesday, Jan. 23, 2018. (AP Photo/Massoud Hossaini, File)
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — A Russian fighter jet struck the propeller of a U.S. surveillance drone over the Black Sea on Tuesday in a “brazen violation of international law,” causing American forces to bring down the unmanned aerial vehicle, the U.S. said.
But Russia insisted its warplanes didn’t hit the MQ-9 Reaper drone. Instead, it said the drone maneuvered sharply and crashed into the water following an encounter with Russian fighter jets that had been scrambled to intercept it near Crimea.
The incident, which added to Russia-U.S. tensions over Moscow’s war in Ukraine, appeared to be the first time since the height of the Cold War that a U.S. aircraft was brought down after an encounter with a Russian warplane.
U.S. President Joe Biden was briefed on the incident by national security adviser Jake Sullivan, according to White House national security spokesman John Kirby. He added that U.S. State Department officials would be speaking directly with their Russian counterparts and “expressing our concerns over this unsafe and unprofessional intercept.”
President Joe Biden walks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy at St. Michael’s Golden-Domed Cathedral on a surprise visit, Monday, Feb. 20, 2023, in Kyiv. (AP Photo/ Evan Vucci)
State Department spokesman Ned Price called it a “brazen violation of international law.” He said the U.S. summoned the Russian ambassador to lodge a protest and the U.S. ambassador to Russia, Lynne Tracy, has made similar representations in Moscow.
The U.S. European Command said two Russian Su-27 fighter jets intercepted the drone while it was operating within international airspace. It said one of the Russian fighters struck the propeller of the MQ-9, causing U.S. forces to bring it down in international waters.
Prior to that, the Su-27s dumped fuel on the MQ-9 and flew in front of it several times in “a reckless, environmentally unsound and unprofessional manner,” the U.S. European Command said in a statement from Stuttgart, Germany.
“This incident demonstrates a lack of competence in addition to being unsafe and unprofessional,” it added.
U.S. Air Force Gen. James B. Hecker, commander of U.S. Air Forces Europe and Air Forces Africa, said the MQ-9 aircraft was “conducting routine operations in international airspace when it was intercepted and hit by a Russian aircraft, resulting in a crash and complete loss of the MQ-9.” He added that “in fact, this unsafe and unprofessional act by the Russians nearly caused both aircraft to crash.”
Pentagon spokesman Air Force Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder said the incident occurred at 7:03 a.m. Central European time (0603 GMT; 2:03 a.m. EST) over international waters, and well clear of Ukraine, after the Russian jets had flown in the vicinity of the drone for 30 to 40 minutes. There did not appear to be any communications between the aircraft before the collision, Ryder added.
The MQ-9 includes a ground control station and satellite equipment and has a 66-foot (20-meter) wingspan. It is capable of carrying munitions, but Ryder would not say whether it was armed. The U.S. had not recovered the crashed drone, U.S. Air Forces-Europe said in a statement, and neither had Russia, Ryder said.
He said it appeared the Russian aircraft also was damaged in the collision, but the U.S. has confirmed that it did land, although Ryder would not say where.
Russia’s Defense Ministry said the U.S. drone was flying over the Black Sea near Crimea and intruded in an area that was declared off limits by Russia as part of what it calls its “special military operation” in Ukraine, causing the military to scramble fighters to intercept it.
“As a result of a sharp maneuver, the MQ-9 drone went into unguided flight with a loss of altitude and crashed into the water,” it said. “The Russian fighters didn’t use their weapons, didn’t come into contact with the unmanned aerial vehicle, and they safely returned to their base.”
The Russian ambassador to Washington, Anatoly Antonov, described the U.S. drone flight as a “provocation” and argued that there was no reason for U.S. military aircraft and warships to be near Russia’s borders.
Anatoly Antonov, Russian ambassador to the United States, departs after meeting with Assistant Secretary of State for Europe Karen Donfried at the U.S. State Department in Washington, Tuesday, March 14, 2023.. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky)
Speaking after meeting with U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Europe Karen Donfried, Antonov insisted that the Russian warplanes didn’t hit the American drone or fire their weapons. He added that Moscow wants “pragmatic” ties with Washington, adding that “we don’t want any confrontation between the U.S. and Russia.”
Moscow has repeatedly voiced concern about U.S. intelligence flights close to the Crimean Peninsula, which Russia seized from Ukraine in 2014 and illegally annexed. The Kremlin has charged that by providing weapons to Ukraine and sharing intelligence information with Kyiv, the U.S. and its allies have effectively become engaged in the conflict.
Kirby emphasized that the incident wouldn’t deter the U.S. from continuing its missions in the area.
“If the message is that they want to deter or dissuade us from flying, and operating in international airspace, over the Black Sea, then that message will fail,” Kirby said. “We’re going to continue to fly and operate in international airspace over international waters. The Black Sea belongs to no one nation.”
FILE NATO Black Sea exercise
The U.S. European Command said the incident followed a pattern of dangerous actions by Russian pilots while interacting with U.S. and allied aircraft over international airspace, including over the Black Sea.
“These aggressive actions by Russian aircrew are dangerous and could lead to miscalculation and unintended escalation,” it warned.
Gen. David Berger, commandant of the Marine Corps, said this type of collision is his greatest concern, both in that part of Europe as well as in the Pacific.
“Probably my biggest worry both there and in the Pacific is an aggressive Russia or China pilot or vessel captain, or something gets too close, doesn’t realize where they are, and causes a collision,” Berger said, in response to a question at a National Press Club event Tuesday.
As fighting continued in Ukraine, a Russian missile struck an apartment building Tuesday in the eastern city of Kramatorsk, killing at least one person and wounding nine others in one of the major urban strongholds the Donetsk region.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy posted a video showing gaping holes in the façade of the low-rise building, which bore the brunt of the strike that damaged nine apartment blocks, a kindergarten, a bank branch and two cars, said regional Gov. Pavlo Kyrylenko.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, speaking with workers at a helicopter factory in southern Siberia, again cast the conflict in Ukraine as an existential one for Russia.
“For us, it’s not a geopolitical task,” Putin said, “it’s the task of survival of Russian statehood and the creation of conditions for the future development of our country.”
Russia had welcomed a Chinese peace proposal, but Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Kyiv’s refusal to talk leaves Moscow with only military options.
“We must achieve our goals,” Peskov told reporters. “Given the current stance of the Kyiv regime, now it’s only possible by military means.”
The Russian onslaught has focused on the devastated eastern city of Bakhmut, where Kyiv’s troops have been fending off attacks for seven months and which has become a symbol of resistance, as well as a focal point of the war.
Zelenskyy discussed Bakhmut with the military brass and they were unanimous in their determination to face down the Russian onslaught, according to the presidential office.
“The defensive operation in (Bakhmut) is of paramount strategic importance to deterring the enemy. It is key for the stability of the defense of the entire front line,” said Valerii Zaluzhnyi, the commander in chief of Ukraine’s armed forces.
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Lolita C. Baldor, Tara Copp, Zeke Miller, Aamer Madhani and Matthew Lee in Washington, and Lorne Cook in Brussels, contributed.
