A foreign man believed to be the primary suspect in last month’s bombing of the Erawan shrine in Bangkok has been arrested on the Cambodian border, Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha said.
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Bangkok bomb suspect arrested
Online reporters
A foreign man believed to be the primary suspect in last month’s bombing of the Erawan shrine in Bangkok has been arrested on the Cambodian border, Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha said.
The prime minister said suspect was apprehended while trying to cross the border at Ban Pa Rai in Aranyaprathet district in Sa Kaeo province.
"It's true. He has been arrested at Sa Kaeo checkpoint," Gen Prayut said. "We are interrogating. He is a main suspect and a foreigner."
A conflicting report said a suspect -- a Chinese national suspected to be an Uighur Muslim -- was captured yesterday at the Phnom Penh airport.
He said the person captured was the man seen in CCTV footage Aug. 17 wearing a yellow shirt and leaving a backpack behind at the Ratchaprasong intersection touristattraction.
Authorities plan to make an official announcement at 5pm about the suspect for whom an arrest warrant had already been issued.
He reportedly was being flown by helicopter back to Bangkok today.
Earlier stories and updates
Updates
More transfers
First immigration police and now city police. Here is the latest from our online reporters:
Sixteen police, including 10 senior officers, stationed in Nong Chok and Min Buri have been transferred to inactive posts in the wake of the arrest of a suspect in the Erawan bombing and seizure of bomb-making materials.
After the Erawan and Sathorn pier explosions, Metropolitan Police Division 3 asked all police stations in its jurisdiction to inspect apartments, mansions, flats and rented houses where foreigners stayed for clues about the deadly blast.
The two stations reported back that there were no suspicious foreigners or bomb-making materials in their areas.
Sa Kaeo immigration chief transferred in bomb case
Online reporters
The chief of Sa Kaeo immigration police, Pol Col Pairat Pukcharoen, and five other officers have been suddenly transferred to Bangkok for an indefinite period forallegedly taking bribes, Thairath Online reported.
National police chief Pol Gen Somyot Poompunmuang has ordered the six immigrationofficers to report the RTP's operations centre by 3pm on Sept 3.
The sudden transfer came after a foreign suspect who was arrested at an apartment in Nong Chok district told police that he paid Sa Kaeo immigration police to enter Thailand, Thairath reported.
The man said that he was using a fake passport and took a flight from Turkey to Vietnam before proceeding to Laos.
From Laos, he hired a vehicle to take him to Cambodia, and entered Thailand via the Sa Kaew border checkpoint where he paid 18,000 baht to officials there so that he did not have to use his fake passport to go through a regular immigration procedure.
Morning story
Bomb pair in Cambodia, say police
PM says gang may have Uighur trafficking links
Wassayos Ngamkham, Patsara Jikkham, AFP & Online reporters
Police believe the two prime bombing suspects in the Erawan and Sathon pierexplosions are hiding in Cambodia and have asked Phnom Penh authorities to huntthem down, a Crime Suppression Division (CSD) source said Monday.
Meanwhile, a reporter on Monday night spoke with the most-wanted Thai Muslim woman, who said she has been in Turkey for the past three months and was "shocked"to be accused of the crime on national Thai TV.
A woman who said she is Wanna Suansan, 26, of Phang-nga, with the Muslim name Maisaroh, told an AFP reporter she had already spoken with police via telephone. Later, she said officers from Bangkok had called her back to tell her not to speak to themedia.
Speaking to AFP by telephone, the woman who identified herself as Wanna said she was currently living in the central Turkish city of Kayseri with her husband and that she was last in Thailand three months ago.
"I have not been to that apartment for almost one year now," she said, adding that she had sublet the flat to a friend of her husband's.
The woman, whose identity AFP could not further confirm, said she was horrified to learn via a Thai friend she had been named as a suspect.
"I was very shocked and thought my friend was joking with me," she said, adding she had been in contact with Thai police and was happy to cooperate with investigators.
Meanwhile, a police source said that checks of the woman's travel records found that she left for Dubai on July 1.
Authorities told the Bangkok Post they had spoken to "a relative" of Ms Wanna, who said she is in Turkey and she would be willing to return to Thailand to meet with officers.
Also on Monday, the prime minister admitted that the network involved in the bombings could be linked to human trafficking rings smuggling Uighurs.
He stressed the need for investigators to find out where the suspect bought the bomb-making materials. "The priority is that we must stop perpetrators from being able toobtain bomb-making components in this country," he said.
The prime minister said rental apartments and hotels must carry out stringentbackground checks when people check in.
A police source said Monday that CSD chief Akkaradej Pimonsri has instructed his deputy, Pol Col Itthipol Atchariyapradit, to ask Cambodian authorities to track downthe two wanted men.
That move came after checks by the Immigration Bureau found the pair entered the Cambodian town of Poipet through the Aranyaprathet border checkpoint in Sa Kaeo. The source said that, "Police expect to arrest them shortly".
Based on CCTV footage, one suspect is the man in the yellow T-shirt who allegedlyplanted the bomb at the Erawan shrine.
The other suspect is the man in a blue shirt who dropped a plastic bag with asuspected explosive device from a footbridge across Sathon canal on Aug 17.
The two are among four suspects wanted on arrest warrants.
Despite only one arrest and no confirmation that he was one of the bombers, nationalpolice chief Somyot Poompunmuang awarded a 3-million-baht reward to members of the police team that arrested the man.
You can see our previous coverage here:
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