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Thai PM says separatism not behind uprising

BANGKOK: Muslim separatism was not driving the unprecedented violence in southern Thailand, Prime Minister Thaksin Shiniwatra said on Saturday, but local media reported the military is looking into its links with regional militant groups.

No one has a very clear idea why scores of Muslim youths attacked security posts in three southern, Muslim-majority provinces, where troops and police shot dead 108 machete-wielding Islamic militants.

The prime minister suggested in his weekly radio address that the young attackers were being used by drugs traffickers and smuggling syndicates. But local newspapers quoted military intelligence officials as saying at least some of the insurgents had contacts with Jemaah Islamiah (JI), a Southeast Asian Muslim network that is seeking to establish an Islamic state across much of the region.

One of the militants killed in the Wednesday violence had the letters “JI” emblazoned on the back of his green shirt.

Authorities in the region say the group is linked to Osama bin Laden’s Al Qaeda network.

“Some claim that separatists were behind the violence,” Thaksin said. “There are mixed factors, but one thing for sure is that those insurgents were used. There were some people behind them. Those people could be manipulated as they were poor.”

Smugglers and drug traffickers have tried to build networks by using impressionable youth, and the ideology of separatism was just a cover for their criminal activities, Thaksin said. “I do not believe that there truly is a separatist ideology.”

But his interior minister, Bhokin Balakula, told reporters on Friday that while criminals and drug traffickers were involved, “separatists are the main players here”. A senior general said the army, which quelled a low-key separatist insurgency in the hilly, impoverished region in the 1970s and 1980s, could face thousands more rebels.

Training abroad: The Bangkok Post on Saturday quoted a military source confirming that the leaders of the uprising were linked to JI and likely had received training abroad.

Thaksin said five policemen and soldiers were killed and 15 injured in the violence. He said 17 insurgents were arrested and six were wounded.

Thailand is reeling from the worst case of separatist violence to hit a country that is famous for its beach resorts and titillating nightlife. —Reuters

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