A widely circulated story about a fried-chicken restaurant in Thailand bearing the name and image of Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler is stale news.
The story was first published on Friday in the London-based Daily Mail, one of the world's most visited news sites, and was picked up by the Bangkok Post among countless others.
The story has a basis in fact but the 'Hitler' restaurant has long since undergone an image makeover as the owner wanted to avoid criticism of any Nazi association. The Daily Mail observed that Hitler's image has appeared and continues to appear in many unusual places in Thailand.
The restaurant is in Ubon Ratchathani, not Bangkok as reported by the Daily Mail. Today it is known as 'H-ler' and bears a different sign, a local correspondent in the northeastern province said.
The picture used in the Daily Mail story was taken sometime in 2011 and copies have appeared in various online forums including Amusingthailand.com.
Andrew Spooner, a Bangkok-based journalist, expressed bemusement at the exposure the old news had received. "My tweet from a couple of months back about Hitler Fried Chicken in Thailand is in Daily Mail," he wrote on Twitter yesterday.