Gary Glitter heads for Hong Kong

(Reuters)

Paedophile pop star Gary Glitter has left Bangkok on a flight to Hong Kong, Thai police said today.

Glitter, who is travelling under his real name Paul Gadd, boarded a flight to Hong Kong this afternoon.

Police Colonel Voravat Amornvivat said Glitter boarded a Thai Airways flight to the Chinese territory after he refused to return to the UK.

Col Amornvivat said airline officials had confirmed that Glitter was a passenger on the Hong Kong flight.

The disgraced singer had refused to board two previous flights from Bangkok to London.

He spent more than 20 hours in the airport's transit lounge before finally getting on the Thai airways service.

Immigration officials in Thailand had said that Glitter would be taken to a detention centre if he continued to refuse to get on a flight.

Glitter was released from a Vietnamese prison yesterday after serving two years and nine months of a three-year sentence for abusing two girls aged 10 and 11.

After his flight from Ho Chi Minh City landed at Bangkok last night, Glitter had been due to board a connecting flight to Heathrow but refused.

An immigration official said Glitter - who was treated for tinnitus in prison - had complained of earache and was taken to an airport clinic.

The official said he was checked over by a doctor before being returned to the transit area of the airport.