Elephants were given special sweaters at a camp in Chiang Mai to keep them warm during a cold spell here in Thailand.

The sweaters were customised to fit the jumbos’ huge bodies at the Maesa Elephant Camp.

Temperatures plunged down to 13 degrees Celcius last week, making it dangerous for the older elephants’ health.

The sanctuary gave more sweaters to elephants aged 65 to 80-years-old to keep them extra warm.

Aside from the sweaters, bonfires were also lit in several areas inside the camp so elephants would feel the heat from the flames.

A kind tailor donated the first pairs of sweaters to the camp which were given to seven elephants before the camp made more to provide to the other jumbos.

A Starbucks branch in Ireland has been ordered to pay compensation to a Thai expat after an employee drew “slanty” eyes on her cup.

Atercin Liffey Unlimited, trading as Starbucks Tallaght, has to pay Suchavadee Foley €12,000 (437,000 baht).

The incident happened on 12 January last year when Ms Foley and her boyfriend went into the Dublin coffee shop to buy a latte.

Ms Foley tried to give a shortened version of her name at the counter as she made her order so it could be written on the cup.

The employee, who is from Brazil, drew a smiley face on the cup later claimed she did so because she thought the customer looked “glamorous”. She had been working at the branch for about a month when the incident happened and said she had been “trained to be nice”.

Ms Foley told the hearing she felt offended and demeaned by the incident. She said she’d been racially abused and it was not a friendly event.

Her boyfriend approached the counter and spoke with the supervisor, who came to apologise. Ms Foley and her parents moved to Ireland from Thailand when she was five or six.

The Workplace Relations Commission found Ms Foley was racially harassed under the Equal Status Act.

In his judgement, Mr Baneham said that instead of Ms Foley’s name being used on her cup, “a physical descriptor was used, in this case her eyes”.

“This was not a drawing of the complainant, but a sketch of one part of her and one clearly associated with race,” he added.

Mr Baneham accepted the employee “did not intend to humiliate her or make her feel uncomfortable” and that “this was a mistake on her part and one that she regrets”.

A spokeswoman for Starbucks said it was “deeply sorry”.

“We have no tolerance for discrimination of any kind at Starbucks,” she said.

“We accept the adjudicator’s conclusion that our partner did not intend to harass this customer and we have retrained the team at this store to ensure this does not take place again.”

Residents in Chiang Mai have been burning charcoal inside clay stoves to keep warm during a winter cold weather spell.

Footage shows locals warming their hands over the flames at the weekend as temperatures in the northern city have plunged to the low teens during the day and single digits at night.

State meteorologist Phuwiang Prakhammin said that winter will be colder and longer than previous years. He expected the cool season to last for approximately 122 days until mid-February, with average lows of 20C to 21C nationwide throughout the entire season, however, temperatures are much lower in northern parts of Thailand.