Thai police widened their search for two missing Russian siblings on Thursday, bringing in sniffer dogs to comb a pond and an abandoned building in Chon Buri province after the pair’s motorcycle was found dismantled and buried in a forest earlier in the week.
Diana Nazimova, 22, and her younger brother Roman Nazimov, 17, have not been seen since they left their home at the Bristol Park Pattaya housing estate in tambon Huay Yai at around 4 a.m. on July 26. Security camera footage showed the two riding out on a black and grey Honda ADV150 motorcycle, waving to guards as they passed the estate’s entrance booth. Their mother has lived in the Bang Lamung district since 2018, and the siblings joined her there in 2021. Neither speaks Thai, according to several news sources, and the family communicates in Russian and English.
The siblings were believed to be heading to a nearby convenience store when they disappeared. Their mother reported them missing to Huay Yai police two days later, telling officers her children had left wearing casual clothes and carrying their phones.
The case took a darker turn on July 29, when local officials investigating the forest near the old Thung Luang cemetery, close to the Chak Taeng intersection in Huay Yai, encountered four men carrying digging tools. The men fled when approached. Police later excavated two separate pits in the area and recovered the siblings’ motorcycle, which had been taken apart, with parts including the wheels, engine and frame split between the two burial sites roughly 100 meters apart.
More than 200 police officers, local officials and volunteers joined the search that followed. Separately, police surrounded a house in Bang Lamung district on Wednesday in an attempt to arrest two men believed to have information about the disappearance, but the men had already left before officers arrived.
By Thursday, the search had entered its fifth day. Pol. Maj. Gen. Kiatisak Sathong-oi, investigative commander of Provincial Police Region 2, is leading the operation, which has shifted to include tambon Na Jomtien in Sattahip district alongside Huay Yai in Bang Lamung district. Officers gave sniffer dogs clothing supplied by the siblings’ mother, then brought the dogs to a pond and a deserted building in Na Jomtien, locations investigators believe may have been among the last places the siblings visited before they vanished.
Neither Diana nor Roman has been located. Police have not said whether the men seen fleeing the forest are considered suspects in the siblings’ disappearance or are being sought only in connection with the buried motorcycle. Investigators are continuing to review CCTV footage from the area, according to several news sources, though no arrests had been announced as of Thursday.
The disappearance has drawn wide attention in Thailand’s expat and tourism communities, given Pattaya’s large foreign resident population and the unusual nature of the discovery. The area around Huay Yai includes both residential estates and stretches of forest and farmland, and is roughly 200 meters from the Na Jomtien to Map Ta Phut motorway.
Authorities have not commented on a possible motive or on the identity of the men spotted digging at the burial site. The investigation remains open, and police say they will continue searching until the siblings are found.
