Bomb attempt raises border issue

Bangkok: Unwinding with bar girls at a beach town came first. Building bombs was allegedly for later.

The three Iranians detained in Bangkok and accused of plotting to attack Israeli diplomats set priorities during their trip to Thailand. They spent several days at a seaside town in the company of prostitutes, soaking up the sun and sin that has attracted many of the world's unsavoury characters.

The "Land of Smiles" has long been a favourite haven for criminals — from Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout to gangsters, drug smugglers and paedophiles — drawn by its open-door visa policy, lax law enforcement and huge variety of white sand beaches.

Thailand's tourism industry rakes in more than $25 billion (Dh91.8 billion) in revenue a year, accounting for more than 6 per cent of the economy. But officials are now questioning if they should roll back the welcome mat a little.

‘Weak link'

"We have to admit that there are threats all over the world, and our country is a weak link," National Security Council chief Wichean Potephosree said after an apparently foiled bomb plot was uncovered when an explosion in the Iranians' rented house Tuesday forced authorities to acknowledge that Thailand was a target of international terrorists.

Within days of the terror scare, the Thai Tourism Ministry put on hold a plan to allow visas on arrival to citizens of Middle Eastern countries, including Iran. Deputy Prime Minister Chalerm Yubumrung said he would order immigration authorities to "closely check people who enter the country, especially from countries that might have problems".

On Friday, police revealed that the three Iranians had more than terror on their minds.

After flying into the resort island of Phuket on February 8, the men moved to Pattaya, a seedy beach town on the Gulf of Thailand known for its abundance of brothels.

They stayed in Pattaya for at least two nights and cavorted with several female sex workers, one of whom was brought to Bangkok to identify the suspects on Thursday, said Lieutenant Colonel Noppon Kuldiloke, a senior immigration police investigator in southern Thailand.

They drank and played snooker together, according to one of the women quoted in Friday's Bangkok Post, which published a mobile phone photo she took of the group.

Arrests

The men left Pattaya on Monday and there the details get murky until the following day at about 2pm, when explosives in their rented Bangkok house blew up accidentally, forcing them to flee. Two suspects, Mohammad Kharzei and Saeed Moradi, were detained in Bangkok. A third suspect, Masoud Sedaghatzadeh, was captured on Wednesday in neighbouring Malaysia as he reportedly tried to return to Iran.

Part of Thailand's problem in tracking criminals is also a regional one.

Borders in south-east Asia are notoriously porous, making it easy to slip out of Thailand and disappear into Malaysia, Laos or Cambodia.

Thai police said on Friday they were searching for two more suspects, including a possible explosives specialist who may have been training the Iranians.

Cash-rich destination