Bangkok backs off in Muslim zones row

It was "merely an idea"

BANGKOK: -- Thailand has stepped back from a controversial scheme advanced by Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra to deny funding to Muslim villages deemed to be supporting separatists.

That came amid a barrage of criticism over his ideas and as killings continued to rock the country's south.

Seven people were shot dead Wednesday and Thursday in escalating attacks in the mainly Buddhist kingdom's three Muslim-majority provinces near the border with Malaysia, authorities reported.

The killings took the death toll since January last year - when the insurgency erupted - to at least 610.

The latest attacks in Yala, Pattani and Narathiwat provinces targeted - as usual - police and government workers. Two police sergeants and several village and district chiefs were killed in separate incidents.

Violence has surged since Thaksin's overwhelming re-election on February 6, and there was a frightening turn last week when insurgents detonated their first car bomb just hours after the prime minister ended a tour of the region.

Amid the barrage of criticism over Thaksin's heavy-handed policies to snuff out the insurgency in an area that is 80 percent Muslim and its people ethnic Malay, his government stepped back from their leader's plan to categorise Muslim villages based on their perceived support for insurgents.

The scheme, which Thaksin announced last week in the south, would have divided about 1,500 villages into red, yellow or green zones.

More than 350 villages stood to be labelled as red - or hostile - which would mean there would be no state funding for services and troops would ``besiege'' them.

But zoning was only a proposal, government spokesman Jakrapob Penkair said Thursday. It was ``merely an idea, not government policy, and as of now it is not being implemented or prepared at all.''

Leading Thai figures have said the plan is discriminatory and unconstitutional and likely to inflame tensions.

Among them have been former Thai military commanders, including one of the king's advisers.

--AFP 2005-02-24

It's not often we hear that Toxin backs off from his plans,pressure this time must have been very hard on him...

It's not often we hear that Toxin backs off from his plans,pressure this time must have been very hard on him...

i think that he is sensibly advised on occasions like this and considering where that advice might be coming from it would be imprudent not to take note of and act on that advice.

Zoning... for his next football team..