Police are looking for a former boyfriend of a Myanmar woman whose body was found in a pond behind a temple in Nakhon Si Thammarat.

Pitthaya Bunyatsak, 27, is wanted on charges of premeditated murder and concealing or moving a human body or destroying it to cover up death or a crime.

Thuzar Aung, known as Nong Sa, 32, worked in a department store coffee shop in Nakhon Si Thammarat and also posted as a social media influencer. She went missing on March 4 and her body was found in a pond behind Wat Thao Khod a week later. She had three stab wounds - one to her throat and two in her chest.

Police said Mr Pitthaya was the victim's former boyfriend and the prime suspect. He had not been seen since March 4 and allegedly also stole a gold necklace weighing 3 baht from the victim and sold it to a gold shop.

He had left his motorcycle parked outside the victim’s room and went by motorcycle-taxi to the provincial bus terminal where he boarded a bus to Phuket. He got off in Krabi province. Police are searching for him.

A close friend of Nong Sa said on Tuesday that Mr Pitthaya had borrowed about 100,000 baht from the victim. After they ended their relationship she had asked him to pay back the money. He had not done so.