Bangkok - Thai immigration police on Thursday arrested the alleged mastermind of a murder attempt on an US citizen, a case the prime minister last week ordered the police to prioritize.

Janpen Oxley, 48, the Thai wife of British national Darren Oxley, was arrested at 7 am Thursday at Aranyaprathet on the Thai-Cambodian border.

Bangkok  - The United Nations on Thursday called on the Thai government for a "transparent" investigation into reports that the navy last month took an estimated
1,000 Rohingya refugees out to sea and set them adrift in boats without engines or supplies.

"We feel very strongly that this needs to be the subject of a transparent investigation," United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) regional representative Raymond Hall said.

Bangkok  - Thailand will propose at an upcoming South-East Asian summit to set up a regional rice reserve in the kingdom to ensure food security, media reports aid Thursday.

The draft proposal will be presented at the 14th summit of the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN) to be held in Hua Hin beach resort, 130 kilometres south-west of the Thai capital, from February 27 to March 1, the Bangkok Post newspaper said.

Bangkok/Geneva - Global unemployment would increase by 18 million to 51 million people this year from 2007 figures, depending on the extent and length of the economic crisis, the International Labour Organization predicted Wednesday.

"We are now facing a global jobs crisis," the UN organization's director general Juan Somavia said in Geneva. "Progress in poverty reduction is unravelling, and middle classes worldwide are weakening. The political and security implications are daunting."

The organization has painted three scenarios for global unemployment in 2009, ranging from bad to worst.

Bangkok - Thailand's Supreme Court on Wednesday upheld a 14-year prison sentence for British national Maurice John Praill on charges of sexually abusing an 8-year-old boy eight years ago.

The ruling was read out to Praill, 77, at a court in Chonburi, 90 kilometres east of Bangkok.

Praiil was arrested in 2001 on charges of sexually abusing a minor at the beach community of Pattaya and sentenced to 14 years in prison but was allowed to live freely in Pattaya on bail for the past eight years as he appealed the case.

Bangkok - Thai authorities arrested 78 Rohingya boat people in Thai waters Tuesday and sought court permission to deport them amid reports that the navy shoved about 1,000 others out to sea last month, half of whom are feared drowned.

The refugees' boat was captured by the Thai navy about 2 am near Surin Island, Phang Nga province, and handed over to police to be processed for deportation back to Myanmar, said Police Colonel Veerasilp Kwansaeng.