Four shot dead across restive Thai south
Friday, 29 August 2008
NARATHIWAT, Aug 28 (AFP): Suspected rebels fighting for a separate state in southern Thailand have shot dead four people in attacks across the Muslim-majority region, police said Thursday.
In Pattani province, a 33-year-old woman and a 29-year-old man were shot dead in separate attacks late Wednesday, while a similar shooting in nearby Yala province killed a 51-year-old state electricity employee.
Also late Wednesday in the third insurgency-hit province of Narathiwat, a government social worker was killed in a drive-by shooting, police said.
More than 3,400 people have been killed since the most recent unrest broke out in January 2004 in the south. Tensions began more than a century ago when Thailand annexed the mainly ethnic Malay sultanate in 1902.
Meantime, anti-government protests in Bangkok have caused the Thai military to postpone discuss withdrawing troops from a disputed border area near an ancient temple, a Cambodian general said Thursday.
Twenty soldiers from Cambodia and Thailand remain stationed at a small pagoda on a patch of disputed land near Cambodia's Preah Vihear temple, while 40 from both sides remain nearby.
Up to 1,000 Cambodian and Thai troops pulled back from the area in mid- August, suggesting that an end to the sometimes tense month-long military stand-off could be near.
In Pattani province, a 33-year-old woman and a 29-year-old man were shot dead in separate attacks late Wednesday, while a similar shooting in nearby Yala province killed a 51-year-old state electricity employee.
Also late Wednesday in the third insurgency-hit province of Narathiwat, a government social worker was killed in a drive-by shooting, police said.
More than 3,400 people have been killed since the most recent unrest broke out in January 2004 in the south. Tensions began more than a century ago when Thailand annexed the mainly ethnic Malay sultanate in 1902.
Meantime, anti-government protests in Bangkok have caused the Thai military to postpone discuss withdrawing troops from a disputed border area near an ancient temple, a Cambodian general said Thursday.
Twenty soldiers from Cambodia and Thailand remain stationed at a small pagoda on a patch of disputed land near Cambodia's Preah Vihear temple, while 40 from both sides remain nearby.
Up to 1,000 Cambodian and Thai troops pulled back from the area in mid- August, suggesting that an end to the sometimes tense month-long military stand-off could be near.