http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/malaysia/10687223/Malaysia-Airlines-live.html
“Malaysia Airlines live: ‘Unprecedented mystery’ of disappearing jet, says civil aviation chief”
by Raf Sanchez By Raf Sanchez, Washington, Harriet Alexander, Steve Wilson, Malcolm Moore in Beijing
10:26PM GMT 10 Mar 2014
SNIPPET: “18.30 The Financial Times has some interesting detail about the tickets used by the two men travelling on stolen passports. Apparently, the tickets were bought from the Grand Horizon travel agency in Thailand and purchased by an Iranian man known to the agency only as “Mr Ali”.
He’s apparently a regular middleman for flight bookings and it’s not clear that he even knew the men were travelling illegally. According to Benjaporn Krutnait, the agency owner, he didn’t specify which flights to put the men on and asked only for the cheapest flights to Europe (they were booked to fly from Beijing on to Amsterdam). The tickets were paid for in cash by an associate of Mr Ali’s.
The FT was unable to reach Mr Ali on a Tehran mobile number.”
SNIPPET: “11.19 Our correspondent in Shanghai, Tom Phillips, has been following the story for us.
He points out that police in Thailand have “removed documentation” from two travel agencies in Pattaya, “which are believed to be involved in the purchase of two tickets using stolen passports.”
The agencies were named as Grand Horizon Travel Agency and Six Stars Travel.”
Previously...
AFP
“MISSING MH370: Thai police target ‘passport ring’ in vanished flight probe”
BANGKOK
SNIPPET: “A senior Thai police official told AFP that authorities were probing a passport racket on the resort island of Phuket, where Maraldi’s passport was stolen.
“A police team combined with local police and immigration are working to track down a passport ring,” southern police commander Panya Mamen said.
A district official in Phuket said that Maraldi had presented himself to police there on Sunday.
“An Italian tourist, Luigi Maraldi, has met southern police commander today in Phuket to say he was not on the plane and his passport had been stolen since last year,” district police lieutenant colonel Akanit Danpitaksart told AFP.
He said they had no information on Kozel’s passport but Austrian foreign ministry spokesman, Martin Weiss, said Sunday that it had been stolen on a flight from Phuket to Bangkok.—AFP”