BRIAN PAINE, a former senior editor with the Kent Messenger Group, has died suddenly in Spain. He was 65.

Mr Paine retired early just over two years ago to enjoy the sunshine of southern Spain where he and his wife, Pam, bought a new home.

They had previously lived in Ashford, Woodchurch and Tenterden.

For several years, Mr Paine headed the Kent Messenger Group's features department responsible for numerous specialist publications, including What’s On, Homes and Motors.

He continued to write articles about Spanish property and the Spanish scene for KMG titles until shortly before his death.

Mr Paine was also editor of Kent Business, the KMG’s monthly business publication, from its inception in 1993, and Kent Business Week, a weekly supplement published with the Kent Evening Post/Kent Today, the discontinued KMG daily newspaper.

Mr Paine took a keen interest in business journalism and enjoyed wide connections with Kent and Medway’s business community. He also helped set up the KMG’s public relations offshoot.

Mr Paine was a Midlander and worked for newspapers in Coventry and Market Harborough before joining the KMG at its Larkfield headquarters in the mid-1980s.

He loved overseas travel and in the early 1980s left the English Midlands to work in the Middle East, firstly in the Gulf state of Qatar and later the island of Bahrain.

After a spell of sub-editing, he became editor of the weekly Gulf Mirror, a newspaper circulating in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman, and the United Arab Emirates.

Mr Paine also leaves two sons, Adrian and Christopher.