A wild monkey stole a tourist's gold chain as she took pictures before police retrieved it from a tree.

The primate pounced on Evarin Niamprang, 23, while she visited a sightseeing spot on a hillside in Chonburi, eastern Thailand with her friends.

While she was focusing on taking a picture of the view, a monkey descended from a tree, ransacked her purse and snapped the chain from her neck.

She spotted the monkey in time and reached for the purse but it was able to take her gold chain back up to the tree.

They had a tug-of-war over the gold chain but she was only able to take the pendant back while the monkey took the necklace and fled.

The shocked tourist then contacted the police and animal rescue team to help her find the monkey to retrieve her 23ct gold necklace, worth around 700GBP.

Officers arrived at the spot and one of them had to climb up the tree to look for the monkey. They spent half an hour before finding thief, who had placed the chain on the top branch of the tree.

The grateful tourist said she let go of the necklace after the monkey tried to attack her.

She said: "While I was trying to drag the necklace from the monkey I saw it started to be angry and try to bite me so I let go."

The hero rescuer Narongkorn Jomprasert warned the tourists to be careful with their valuables when visiting the spot.

He said: "The monkey here can sometimes be troublemakers and the tourists should be aware of that and should watch their valuables very carefully.''