VIDEO: This Week's Top Stories November 11

Online visa extensions, triad arrests, a speeding Lamborghini and 2 baht meth pills

Online visa extensions
The Immigration Bureau unveiled its new Electronic Extension of Temporary Stay service this week, making it easier for expats to apply for visa extensions.
The service covers the whole process including the payment of fees via a dedicated website, reducing the application process time from one hour to three minutes.
The growing number of applicants spurred concern about the time-consuming and inconvenient nature of the current process.
The e-Extension service will be piloted first for Bangkok expats.

Triads targeted
The heads of two major Chinese triads operating in Thailand were arrested and another three blacklisted in a crackdown on illegal businesses operated by foreigners.
The police conducted wide-sweeping stings which led to the arrest of many suspects for operating illegal entertainment venues and for alleged involvement in drug networks.
Popular nightspot Club One Pattaya was raided by police and around 200 foreign and Thai customers stampeded from the building without an arrest being made.

Speeding Lamborghini
A brand new Lamborghini driven by a Singaporean man caused a minor pileup on the Don Meuang Tollway, injuring five people.
Emergency responders found a Toyota Vigo pickup truck overturned near a damaged Toyota Altis.
Further up the tollway was a yellow Lamborghini that had also sustained heavy damage.
Meanwhile Thon Buri district court sentenced a police doctor, charged with drunk driving and causing two deaths in a crash in Bangkok last year, to three years in jail suspended for two years.
The doctor lost control of his Porsche and crashed into a Honda Civic, killing two.
During the investigation, Dr Panurak Rattanapaisorn said he did not feel drunk while driving and the accident was a result of the wet road.

'Two baht a pill'
Methamphetamine pills, which cost as much as 300 baht apiece in Thailand just a few years ago, can now be had for as little as two baht each.
Undercover police officers paid a Lop Buri dealer 4,000 baht and received a bag containing 2,000 speed pills in return.
Prices of methamphetamine have been plunging in light of the extreme volumes being produced in the region, mostly in lawless pockets of Myanmar and the Golden Triangle.

Vocabulary

  • apiece: for each one - แต่ละ
  • blacklist (verb): to put the name of a person, a company, a product or a country on a blacklist (a list of the names of people, companies, products or countries that an organization or a government considers unacceptable and that must be avoided) - ใส่ในบัญชีรายชื่อของคนที่ทำไม่ดี
  • crackdown: strong action that someone in authority takes to stop a particular activity - การใช้กำลังเข้าปราบปรามของเจ้าหน้าที่
  • expatriate (expat): a person living in a country that is not their own - คนที่อาศัยอยู่ต่างประเทศ (เป็นเวลานาน)
  • extension: making a period of time longer - การขยายออกไป
  • inconvenient: causing difficulties or extra effort - ซึ่งไม่สะดวก
  • overturn: to turn upside down or on the side - พลิกคว่ำ, คว่ำลง
  • pileup: when many cars and vehicles hit each other on the road in a big chain reaction, each hitting the back of the next car to come to a stop -
  • pilot: of a plan, product or system that is used to test how good something is before introducing it - นำร่อง
  • plunge: to fall quickly from a high position - ดิ่งลงมาจากท้องฟ้า
  • pocket: a small area which has a particular quality that makes it different from the areas around it -
  • raid: to forcefully and suddenly enter a place to catch criminals or to search for something like drugs - ใช้กำลังเข้าค้นสถานที่หรือ จับกุมคนร้าย
  • stampede (noun): (of a large group of people or animals) to run in an uncontrolled way because they are frightened or excited - ความแตกตื่นโกลาหล, ความระส่ำระสาย, ความอลหม่าน
  • sting operation: an action by police to catch criminals by tricking them, e.g. by pretending to buy illegal drugs -
  • suspend a sentence: a situation when the court decides that the person who has been proven guilty of a crime does not have to undergo the punishment given, usually under certain conditions - รอลงอาญา
  • time-consuming: taking a lot of time to do or finish - ที่สิ้นเปลืองเวลามาก, ที่กินเวลา
  • triad: a secret Chinese organisation involved in illegal activities such as selling drugs -
  • volume (noun): an amount of something - ปริมาณ
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