Rihanna poses with protected primate in Thailand

Pop star Rihanna spent a weekend at the beach in Thailand, leaving behind a trail of racy tweets and incriminating Instagram photographs that led police to arrest two people for allegedly peddling protected primates.

On a break from her Diamonds World Tour, Rihanna stopped in Thailand to visit the island of Phucket, where she befriended some local wildlife.

She posted a link on Twitter to an Instagram photo that showed her in sunglasses snuggling up to a furry primate called the slow lorris, and tweeted Friday "Look who was talking dirty to me!".

The slow loris, a squirrel- like animal with big eyes, is native to Southeast Asia and is listed as a protected species.

"Phuket authorities were alerted to the picture of (Rihanna), and last night police arrested the two individuals who brought out the lorris as a photo opportunity for tourists," a Phucket district chief, Weera Kerdsirimongkon, said by telephone Sunday.

Police confiscated two loris from the pair - a-20-year-old man and a-16-year-old boy - who could face charges of possession of protected animals. The charge carries a penalty of up to 4 years in prison and a $1,300 fine.

Weera said authorities have tried for years to crackdown on the problem of vendors exploiting wildlife, particularly in popular tourist areas where people pay to pose for pictures with elephants, orangutans and other animals.

"It's like a cat-and-mouse game. But this time it's bigger because a celebrity like Rihanna posted the picture, and there were more than 2000,000 'likes' from the world," he said.

Rihanna also posted pictures of herself playing with a herd of elephants in the street Friday night, after which she tweeted: "They all hails Empress when She walk by."

On the same night, she tweeted a few unprintable comments about what she apparently witnessed at an adult show in one of Phucket's red-light districts.

Citings shootings, Obama says must 'go back' gun control push

President Obama urged supporters on Saturday to "to go back at it" and purse gun control measures after mass shootings in Washington and Chicago in

the past week put the spotlight back onto the problem of gun violence in the United States.

Obama made passing tough gun laws a top priority after a gunman killed 20 children and six adults at an elementary school in Newtown, Connecticut, in December, stunning the nation.

But Congress rejected his proposals to restrict sales of certain types of guns and require greater background checks. Gun-right groups opposed the measures, saying they would infringe on Americans' constitutional rights.

"We fought a good fight earlier this year, but we came up short, and that means we've got to get back up and go back at it," Obama told an awards dinner for the congressional Black Caucus Foundation.

"As long as there are those who fight to make it easy as possible for dangerous people to get their hands on guns, then we've got to work as hard as possible for the sake of our children....to do more work to make it harder," he said to applause.

The Obama administration has largely moved on to other priorities since the gun measures were defeated in Congress, but a recent spate of shootings has brought the issue back into the headlines.

Last Monday, a government contractor killed 12 people during rampage at the Washington Navy Yard before police killed him in a gun battle.