Suspected Erawan shrine bomber Bilal Turk, also known as Adem Karadag, has confirmed he placed a rucksack laden with explosives at the shrine on Aug 17, according to his lawyer.
Speaking after a three-hour meeting with Mr Karadag at the 11th Army Circle where he is being held, lawyer Choochart Khanpai said the suspect confessed that he put a rucksack with explosives inside near the fence of the shrine at Ratchaprasong intersection.
Mr Karadag said Abdullah Abdulrahman, another suspect, ordered him to place the backpack there, the lawyer said, adding the suspect did not say why he had to follow the orders of this man.
The suspect said he was born in Urumqi, the capital of Xinjiang Autonomous Region in the Northwest of China, before migrating to Turkey, the lawyer said.
Mr Karadag said he is an ethnic Uighur but has neither a Turkish nor a Chinese passport.
His client told him that he intended to travel through Thailand to Malaysia, the lawyer said.
Along the journey, Mr Karadag told him he paid a trafficker US$1,200 (44,000 baht) in China, $200 in Vietnam and $600 in Laos before arriving in Thailand, Mr Choochart said. Upon getting to Bangkok, he stayed in Room 414 at the Pool Anant apartment in Nong Chok district of the capital and he allegedly only once met Mr Abdulrahman in Room 412.
Mr Choochart said Mr Karadag speaks only basic English and a Uighur language interpreter will be sought to contact his relatives in Turkey.
The lawyer said he had decided to take Mr Karadag's case because he had handled other cases involving Turkish nationals before.
Also on Wednesday, police gave more information about Odd Prayoonwong, or Yongyuth Pobkaew, a Thai suspect wanted under an arrest warrant in connection with the Erawan shrine and Sathon pier bombings on Aug 17 and 18 respectively.
Odd: Linked to politics-related bombings
Police earlier said they could not rule out a political motive behind the blasts because Mr Odd had been linked to two politically-motivated bomb attacks in 2010 and last year.
Metropolitan Police Bureau chief Srivara Ransibrahmanakul, who has been promoted to assistant police chief today, said Mr Odd was wanted under an arrest warrant in connection with an explosion in Min Buri district last year, which killed two people allegedly carrying pipe bombs that went off accidentally.
Mr Odd was in the same group led by Kasi Ditthanarat, wanted under an arrest warrant linked to the deadly blasts at the Samarn Metta Mansion in 2010, he said.
Pol Lt Gen Srivara said he had ordered four police teams to track him down.
Pol Maj Gen Chayapol Chatchaidet, commander of Metropolitan Police Division 6, said witnesses said they saw Mr Odd meet Thai female suspect Wanna Suansan at the Maimuna Garden Home apartment in Min Buri, where bomb-making materials were found. That led police to seek his arrest warrant, he said, but no surveillance cameras captured images of him at the time of the shrine blast.
Pol Col Manop Sukonthanapat, superintendent of Talad Phlu police station, said Mr Odd has a stepson from his new wife and now the stepson lives in Samut Sakhon's Krathum Baen district.
After having a daughter, Mr Odd, his wife and their daughter went to live above a beauty shop in Bangkok's Phaya Thai district.
Their daughter was then adopted by an Australian person. She is now about 16.
Pol Col Manop said Mr Odd's 80-year-old mother, who is in a nursing home in Chon Buri's Bang Lamung district, told investigators who showed her the pictures of Mr Odd that the man is her son.
