Two Soldiers Killed, Six Wounded in Pattai Road Side Bombing

Thai bomb squad members inspect the site of a roadside bomb attack by suspected separatist militants. More than 5,000 people have been killed in nine years of bloodshed in Thailand’s Muslim-majority south near the border with Malaysia, with shadowy insurgent groups blamed for near-daily bombings and shootings.—Photo by AFP

 

 

PATTANI – Police say two soldiers were killed and six were wounded in a roadside bombing in Thailand’s insurgency-plagued south.

Police Col. Manit Yimsai said on Thursday that suspected insurgents detonated an improvised bomb hidden on the road surface in

Thai soldiers examine the wreckage of a personnel carrier that was exploded after suspected insurgents detonated a roadside bomb in Pattani Province

Pattani province’s Panarae district.

The soldiers were in two armored vehicles traveling Wednesday night to inspect damages from an earlier militant attack.

One of the personnel carriers was badly damaged. The attack was one of 36 incidents overnight in Pattani.

Authorities said suspected militants set fires on tires, cell towers, telephone booths, buildings and closed-circuit cameras. No other casualties were reported.

Thailand’s efforts to tackle an intensifying conflict between Muslim separatists and Buddhists in the country’s four southern provinces could come undone because of its own handling of the crisis and looming elections in neighboring Malaysia, say analysts.

Malaysia, a predominantly Muslim country, has taken an unprecedented role in facilitating the Thai government’s new peacemaking approaches to the mainly Malay-speaking separatists.