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UK Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State calls on Vice Minister
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On 27 July 2009, Mr. Chris Bryant, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, paid a courtesy call on Mr. Panich Vikitsreth, Vice Minister for Foreign Affairs, at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Both sides held wide ranging talks and exchanged views on the outcome of the 42nd ASEAN Foreign Ministers Meeting and related meetings during 17-23 July in Phuket, particularly on the Myanmar and Korean Peninsular issues.
Regarding the reported case of extortion involving two British tourists at Suvarnnabhumi Airport, the Vice Foreign Minister said that the Royal Thai Government had given the top priority to the issue as it might affect the country’s image and Thailand’s tourism industry. He stressed that the problem would be handled with transparency and in accordance with the law and if there were any irregularities, the law would be strictly enforced. In this connection, the Foreign Ministry had already sought cooperation from the relevant authorities in order to resolve the problem.
The Vice Foreign Minister also took this opportunity to expressed concern over the UK’s new immigration law and the new points based system (PBS) introduced to consider visa applications which has led to problems for many Thai students applying for visas to the UK. The British side explained that there indeed were some difficulties when the new system was introduced and that the effort was being made to explain the new procedure to educational institutions in the UK so as to facilitate the visa application process.
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