New Bomb Find In Southern Thailand

[george]

New bomb find in southern Thailand

Tension in the town of Sungai Golok rises sharply after the bomb is discovered in a vehicle, two days after Saturday's blast

NARATHIWAT: -- Tension in the border town of Sungai Golok in southern Thailand escalated dramatically following the discovery of another bomb here yesterday morning.

The bomb was found in a package at the Sungai Golok Customs Office, just metres from the Malaysian border, at 10am local time (11am Malaysian time) - peak hour at the gateway between the two countries, Bernama reported.

Thailand customs officials say the bomb was discovered in the luggage compartment of a four-wheel-drive vehicle belonging to the department.

According to Bernama, the Thai Army bomb disposal unit was called to detonate it. The border gate is only 2km from the town of Sungai Golok, in which Saturday's bomb blast occurred. In that incident, 28 people, including 10 Malaysians, were injured.

The bombing is part of a wave of violence in which 60 people have been killed since January.

Already, the fear and tension since the explosion over the weekend have caused tourists to desert Sungei Golok. The fear also hit the Thai stock market yesterday, causing it to fall 3 per cent.

The bombs are likely to have a devastating impact on the economy of Sungei Golok, at least in the short term.

'Certainly, the number of tourists will reduce and worries about safety and security will cause foreign tourists to cancel their trips to other spots along the border,' the chief of the Pattani Tourism Promotion Association Anusart Suwanmongkol told journalists.

Apart from regular trade, and locals crossing the border to visit family and friends on either side, the town is noted for its murky economy revolving around bars, sex tourism and smuggling.

About 1.4 million out of Thailand's 10 million-plus foreign tourists visit the three southernmost provinces of Narathiwat, Yala and Patytani every year, many of them day-trippers and short-term visitors from Malaysia.

Deputy Prime Minister Wan Muhamad Noor Matha acknowledged fears of a wider impact on Thailand's US$8 billion (S$13.6 billion) tourism industry yesterday when he emerged from visiting bomb victims in hospital. 'These people deliberately want to damage the tourism environment.'

Saturday's blast was the first attack on a tourist-oriented entertainment venue. The industry is worried that a dip in international and even local tourism may take the joy out of Songkran - Thailand's famed annual water festival which is just two weeks away.

But officials yesterday said the damage will likely be limited to the southern provinces, leaving other more upscale destinations like Phuket unscathed.

Yesterday, police in the south sharply stepped up efforts to find those responsible for the blast and to enhance security. Some 10 people were questioned and a composite drawing of a suspect was distributed to police officers.

Round-the-clock checkpoints were set up, and efforts to find and seize unregistered or stolen motorcycles moved into top gear. Attackers responsible for the deaths in the south since early January have largely used motorcycles, a common form of transport there. Saturday's bomb was planted on a motorcycle.

Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra told reporters yesterday that the situation in the south has reached a 'turning point' and the government was getting closer to apprehending perpetrators.

'Don't worry about it, just be patient,' he said.

--The Straits Times 2004-03-30

[george]

Thai military reshuffled amid escalating violence in south

BANGKOK: -- The Thai government on Monday announced the change of military brass of the Fourth Army in charge of the country's violence-plagued deep south.

The reshuffle, including the change of 493 military officers' positions, consolidated the current caretaker commander Pisan Watawongkiri as the chief of the Fourth Army stationed in the south.

"Lieutenant General Pisan is an official accepted by Muslims living in the south," Defense Minister Chettha Thanajaro told reporters after declaring the changes.

The newly appointed southern army chief was a person good at negotiation and he would surely help the situation back to normal,added Chettha, who took office only half a month ago in a cabinet reshuffle aimed to address the spiraling violence against authorities in the Muslim-dominant south since the beginning of this year.

On January 4, a group of armed men torched down some 20 schools,killed four soldiers and looted more than 300 weapons in the southsome 1,000 kilometers south of Bangkok and close to Malaysia to the south.

Though the government has been trying to tackle the problem through multi-fold measures including implementation of martial laws and improved communication with local Muslim communities, the region has witnessed escalating violence in the past two months against public servants and Buddhism monks.

The violence claimed by the government as local separatists' work seemed to divert its target to civilians with the latest explosion on Saturday evening injuring about 30 people including 7Malaysian tourists.

The situation grew even worse when the army and police were accused by local people and activists of violating human rights oflocal people when hunting down suspects and carrying out investigation.

Pisan, having worked in the south for more than 20 years, however, was deemed as the one who was less likely to pursue a tough solution for the current situation and more possible to win local people's trust, according to Chettha.

When southern Muslim leaders declared suspension of cooperation with the government on the south problem and required meeting withPrime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra earlier this year, Pisan was oneof those who went between the authorities and southern Muslim communities and finally put forward the process, an anonymous high-rank military source told Xinhua's stringer.

The reshuffle order endorsed by the King of Thailand also declared the removal of the former Fourth Army chief Pongsak Ekbannasingh to the position of the Army's deputy chief of staff.

The other two deputy commanders of Preeda Piboonsak and Nipat Tapmongkol were also shifted to high-ranking posts of the Army's Supreme Command Headquarters.

Pongsak and the former national police chief Sant Sarutanond were sacked on March 20 for the failure of tackling the southern situation.

--Agencies 2004-03-30

[george]

Thailand delays development after blast

BANGKOK: -- Thailand on Monday delayed its 300 million dollar development package for the kingdom's Muslim-majority south in the wake of a bomb attack that wounded 28 civilians and signaled a new level of violence.

Deputy Prime Minister Chavalit Yongchaiyudh said the government had put the special budget on hold for the three southernmost provinces of Yala, Pattani and Narathiwat until further assessments of the situation could be made.

"The government will delay spending its budget on the development projects for the south," he said.

The aid package of 12 billion baht (303 million dollars) -- including three billion baht for security operations and nine billion for economic and social development -- was approved by the Thai cabinet in a special meeting in Pattani two weeks ago.

Deputy Prime Minister Chaturon Chaisaeng flew to the southern provinces on Monday to gain an in-depth view of the situation, including a survey of the attitudes of locals towards the violence, following Saturday's blast in Narathiwat's Sungai Kolok, a town on the Malaysian border that is packed with nightspots, karaoke bars and brothels.

Chavalit said authorities had been confounded by the latest attack, the first against civilians in a three month campaign of violence that has seen at least 55 soldiers, police, government officials and even Buddhist monks killed.

Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra and others have blamed the violence on Islamic separatist groups, some of which have operated for decades, as well as gangs linked to corrupt local politicians and business interests.

"The harder we hit them the more the problems will grow, and the harder we push for development, the greater the violence," Chavalit added.

He said the most important immediate task was to reduce residents' fears and their feelings of injustice in the way southerners were treated by the central authority.

"This is not easy to resolve, but when we do it will mean we have solved the problems in the south by (as much as) 50 per cent," Chavalit said.

Violence in the region has raged virtually unchecked since a brazen raid on a Narathiwat arms depot on January 4 killed four soldiers. A government spokesman has dismissed the possibility that outside forces including regional terror groups had a hand in Saturday's blast, but investigations into the attack have made little headway.

"We have several assumptions for the cause of the bomb attack. It will become more clear in the next few days," Interior Minister Bhokin Bhalakula told reporters Monday.

Narathiwat's governor Wichom Thongsong said Sunday the attack was carried out in retaliation over efforts to rein in the violence, including last week's arrest of nine people linked with the January 4 raid.

Meanwhile, the Tourism Authority of Thailand (TAT) warned that the latest bomb attack could precipitate a tourism collapse of more than 20 per cent for the southern region unless the unrest was brought under control.

About 1.4 million foreign tourists visited Thailand's three southernmost provinces in 2003, 80 per cent of them Malaysians.

--AFP 2004-03-30

[elephantspike]

http://straitstimes.asia1.com.sg/latest/st...,243090,00.html?

Thai bombers escaped to M'sia: Thaksin

BANGKOK - The perpetrators of a weekend bomb attack in Thailand's Muslim south have slipped across the border to Malaysia due to red tape that delayed their arrest, Premier Thaksin Shinawatra said on Tuesday.

Mr Thaksin said Thai authorities were working with Malaysian officials to track down the suspects who are believed to be hold dual citizenship and can easily cross border checkpoints, but did not disclose their identities.

'As a matter of fact, the bombers should have been arrested that night but there were many administrative delays including in seeking approval of arrest warrants, therefore on Monday they slipped into Malaysia,' he told reporters.

No one has claimed responsibility for the bomb planted on a motorcycle in a nightlife district of Sungai Kolok which injured 28 people including eight Malaysians, the latest in a wave of violence which erupted in January.

Foreign Minister Surakiart Sathirathai said earlier that the government would seek Malaysia's cooperation on the issue of dual-citizenship holders who are blamed for much of the unrest.

Southern Thailand has been rocked this year by an eruption of violence that has killed over 55 people, mainly government officials and security forces.

Mr Thaksin admitted on Tuesday that the escalating violence had left him 'extremely exhausted' but he vowed to press on until the problems were solved and to travel to the south shortly to intervene personally. -- AFP

[et33.com]

tell me more...

looks to me like

more things are getting out of hands

in thailand

[aaaaaa]

does it make u more excited or what?

or satisfied within that it is in Taihland, not in your own country?

[Boon Mee]

Yep, they'll be swarming over the border any minute now. Property values in Phuket are taking a nose dive as we speak!