Thailand 'one of the most dangerous tourist destinations on Earth': Expat investigation lifts lid on dark side of the Land of Smiles Thailand: Deadly Destination penned by Australian author John Stapleton Writer says tourism boom has created hatred and contempt for foreigners Death rate of tourists is ‘worst scandal in the annals of modern tourism’ Murder of British backpackers followed military coup in May this year Ministry of Tourism forecast 25m visitors in 2015, down from 30m last year   By  SIMON CABLE FOR MAILONLINE PUBLISHED:  20:18 AEST, 15 November 2014  |  UPDATED:  01:08 AEST, 17 November 2014           8k shares 785 View comments A new book has branded Thailand one of the world’s most dangerous tourist destinations. Australian author John Stapleton suggests that widespread police corruption, violence and crime are all blighting a country once commonly referred to a...

EXTRACTS FROM THAILAND: DEADLY DESTINATION BY JOHN STAPLETON FROM CHAPTER ONE FRUIT FOR THE PICKING The daily robbing, bashing, drugging, extortion and murder of foreign tourists on Thai soil, along with numerous scandals involving unsafe facilities and well established scams, has led to frequent predictions that Thailand’s multi-billion dollar tourist industry will self-destruct. Instead tourist numbers more than doubled in the decade to 2014. Both the Thai Tourism Authority and the Thai Ministry of Tourism forecast an astonishing 30 million tourist arrivals per annum in 2015 and beyond. The world might not have come to the hometowns of the many visitors fascinated by Thailand, but it certainly came to the Land of Smiles. While the Thai media is heavily censored, and bad news stories about tourists suppressed, nonetheless there is more than enough evidence to demonstrate that something has gone seriously awry with the nation’s tourist industry. In 2014, just ...

The murders in Koh Tao 'expose the dark side of a country loved by many Western tourists'   By  Natalie Paris 2:21PM GMT 13 Nov 2014 8 Comments In the week that the  ruling military has banned a British book about Thailand’s struggle for democracy , another is about to claim that the tourist industry has gone seriously awry. “Thailand: Deadly Destination” is soon to be published and attempts to explain why a million fewer tourists are predicted to visit the beach-rich nation this year, following a military coup and the unsolved murder of two British backpackers in September. The book’s publicity material claims that, in terms of tourist safety, Thailand scores very badly. “In 2014, just as in the years preceding it, there were train, bus, ferry, speedboat, motorbike and car accidents, murders, knifings, unexplained deaths, numerous suicides, diving accidents, robberies gone wrong, anonymous bodies washing up on the sho...