Thai Troops Sent South to Quell Muslim Unrest

[Quetzal]

Thai Troops Sent South to Quell Muslim Unrest

PATTANI, Thailand (Reuters) - Troops fanned out across southern Thailand on Thursday to restore order after a day of carnage in which security forces shot dead 107 Muslim militants and the army said it faced thousands more insurgents.

Army chiefs ordered two extra battalions of soldiers into the three southernmost provinces as the predominantly Buddhist "Land of Smiles" digested what newspapers described as one of the bloodiest days in Thailand's modern history.

Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra said 107 "bandits" and five soldiers and police died in the fighting, which started when gangs of black-robed young men, some wearing Islamic slogans, launched dawn attacks on around 15 army and police posts.

The reports of suicidal attackers and pictures of the bloody corpses of lightly armed men splashed across front pages have sparked concerns a Muslim separatist rebellion that rocked the region in the 1970s and 1980s has returned with a vengeance.

more...

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=574&ncid=721&e=2&u=/nm/20040429/wl_nm/security_thailand_dc

[FoolishMoon]

1. Yikes

I've lived in Thailand for over a year now, and am leaving next week. It's a bit scary. But I have learned to take anything PM Thaksin says with a grain of salt. He often shoots his mouth off. And he declared victory in the War on Drugs, after 2,000 or so folks were killed (many by Thai police.) So yes, there is a long-standing movement in the South of Thailand, where the majority are Muslims (in a country that is 95% Buddhist)who don't speak Thai, but a dialect of Malay. Take a look at a map of Thailand--that long strip of land in the south, running alongside Malysia--another example of map-making that fails to take into account the people living there. I fear things will get worse before they get better. How long before the violence comes north to Bangkok, a city of millions?