The 70-year-old man found dead in a Phuket guest house on Tuesday night was Joseph Spiteri, a Maltese Australian who lived in Melbourne, Victoria.

The man was described by Thailand’s Phuket Tourism site as a heavy smoker and an asthmatic.

The tourism site said he was found by his girlfriend naked on a bed at the Maximum Guesthouse in Nanai Road, Patong.

He was one of three expats found dead overnight. Although not suspicious, their deaths still had to be explained, authorities said.

The others are a 24-year-old Frenchman found hanging from a doorway at a house in Moo 7, Saiyuan, Rawai and a 29-year-old American woman found in a guesthouse in Rawai, southern Phuket.