The latest territory to benefit from Disney’s Asian broadcasting expansion, Thailand’s channel universe will get a bit bigger next year with the addition of Disney Channel and Playhouse Disney as 24-hour channels on the region’s P. Southern Network. The partnership with PSN should give Disney some additional leverage in convincing Thailand’s Cable TV Association, a group of 500 cable operators, to include the Disney channels in their basic programming packages.

Disney is currently working on dubbing and subtitling its programming into Thai, and the full schedule should be ready to go by February 2006. Walt Disney Television International has also produced a short animated feature based on the Thai folk tale Legends of the Ring of Fire, which explains how the moon came to exist.

Playhouse Disney is also getting a boost in Korea, where the preschool net has joined the Hello D digital platform of cable TV operator CJ CableNet. This new carriage deal expands Playhouse’s reach into Korea from eight regions to 23.