Covid-19 gives peace a chance in South Thailand

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Covid-19 gives peace a chance in South Thailand

Thai Muslim insurgents commit for first time in 17-year conflict to de facto ceasefire to facilitate humanitarian response to Covid-19

By ANTHONY DAVIS

 

A Muslim man wearing a face mask as a preventive measure against the spread of the Covid-19 novel coronavirus takes part in prayers at a mosque in Pattani, March 27, 2020. Photo: AFP/Tuwaedaniya Meringing

 

BANGKOK – What an unrelenting military crackdown has failed to deliver in 17 years of fighting, the insidious advance of the Covid-19 virus across Thailand’s restive southern border provinces may have achieved in just two weeks: a rare opportunity for peace in what had seemed like an endless conflict.

 

On April 3, the Patani Malay National Revolutionary Front, or BRN, the insurgent organization that has spearheaded the separatist revolt in the mainly Malay Muslim border region, announced it was willing, at least temporarily, to put down its arms on humanitarian grounds and facilitate the response to a threat it described as the “principal enemy of the human race.”

 

The watershed one-page statement, dated April 3 and bearing the stamp of the group’s Central Secretariat, represents the first time the rebel group has publicly committed to what amounts to a de facto ceasefire.

 

Full story: https://asiatimes.com/2020/04/covid-19-gives-peace-a-chance-in-south-thailand/

 

-- ASIA TIMES 2020 04-07

[Emdog]

If it takes a deadly pandemic to result in a cease fire, I'd say the regular peace negotiations aren't going all that well...

[TEFLKrabi]

I sincerely hope that they now see the benefits of peace and sit around a table to discuss a peaceful future.

[Bangkok Barry]

The muslim conflict that the world ignores, which just underlines how unimportant Thailand is on the world stage. Far more have died than on 9/11 but nobody cares.

[RichardColeman]

Hopefully all the violent insurgent are hugging each other currently in mosques

[marko kok prong]

One doubt's the gangster filth calling themselves Muslim,in southern Philippines-Abu sayaaf will do the same,no doubt they will see it as an opportunity why the President is busy shooting drug user's and curfew violaters he seems to have done little to curb there activities

[Stocky]

9 hours ago, Bangkok Barry said:

The muslim conflict that the world ignores, which just underlines how unimportant Thailand is on the world stage. Far more have died than on 9/11 but nobody cares.

It's not a Muslim conflict, rather those in conflict happen to be Muslims. The issue is a people, with their own language, culture, history and religion being incorporated into a country they have no connection with at the whim of an imperial power (British Empire) with absolutely no say in the matter. This then compounded by their being subjected to a programme of Thaiification that seeks to deny them their heritage, language and culture.

 

I doubt you'd roll over and take it either!