Bangkok Bombing Reward Climbs to $85K

Prime suspect… the Royal Thai Police released this image of a man in a yellow T-shirt near the Erawan Shrine before the explosion.

Two other suspects who were identified on security footage and believed to be accomplices have been questioned and cleared by police.

Prayuth, however, ruled out working with U.S. investigators, insisting Thais can do the job. “We still have to investigate in more detail”, he said.

The government says the attack was unlikely to be the work of global terrorists.

The moment of the blast as captured by a security camera at 6:55pm on Monday night. The crater left by the blast has been paved over with fresh cement.

Religious ceremonies were held to honor the victims of the deadly bombing at a Bangkok shrine four days ago.

Office worker Pratuang Limkul was among many Bangkok residents who also came to pay respects.

“We don’t even know who she is”, Somyot said.

Monday’s blast killed 20 people, mostly Asian visitors, leaving the police scrambling to find the assailants and sending shockwaves through the nation’s vital tourism sector. Two victims stay unidentified.

Today, life has more or less returned to normal, with several businesses in full swing and the people slowly trickling into the vicinity of the shrine, a magnet for tourists. “And with the photogenic mix of incense, gold leaf and classical dancers hired as offerings, it also became a main tourist attraction”, she said.

National police spokesman Prawut Thavornsiri confirmed that the new footage was being examined to decide whether the man dropping the package into the water near Saphan Thaksin pier was a suspect.

Police have released a sketch of a suspect – depicting him with eyeglasses and bushy, black hair – and offered a reward that on Friday was raised to 3 million baht ($85,000). A warrant issued Wednesday describes him as a “foreign man”.

In a televised statement Thursday, however, military spokesman Col. Winthai Suvaree cast doubt on an global connection.

“It seems like a conscious effort on the part of the government to present a certain narrative of what has happened”, Matthew Wheeler, Bangkok-based security analyst at the global Crisis Group, said.

He added that Chinese tourists were not the “direct target”. “Now that I cleaned it, you think my actions are suspect”.

Thai people can do more to bring back peace by treating tourists well so that they spread the word about Thai hospitality, he said. No one has taken responsibility for the attack.

Thailand’s former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra’s son offered Dollars 1,96,449 reward for the arrest of those behind the blast in the Brahma temple on Saturday, as authorities failed to make any arrests in the country’s worst attack that killed 20 people.

Other speculation points closer to home. “In 2010 and 2014, political protests, some with violence, erupted at this major intersection, which in turn gave justification for the 2014 military coup that remains in power in the country”.