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Attacks kill 2 in Thailand as 8 held on terror charges

Gunmen killed a police officer and a state official in Thailand's mainly Muslim south yesterday, police said, a day after authorities arrested eight Muslims suspected of planning attacks on state property and officials.

A gunman shot a Buddhist traffic policeman as he drove to work in Pattani province and a Muslim official was shot dead while riding his motorcycle to collect electricity payments in nearby Yala province, police said.

They were the latest casualties in violence that has claimed more than 250 lives since January.

"The police killing is obviously linked to the unrest," said Colonel Chaiyan Supachaiyakit of the Yarang police.

Police declined to speculate on the motive for the killing in Yala, but said it was not a robbery since the 50-year-old official still had 10,000 baht ($245) cash on him.

The government has alternately blamed bandits, crime bosses, Muslim militants and anti-Western sentiment in the Islamic world for the daily explosions and shootings in the region, home to a fifth of Thailand's 7.5 million Muslims.

Despite sending thousands of troops to bolster security and promising millions of dollars in aid, the government has failed to stop the unrest in the Malay-speaking region near Malaysia.

Security officials arrested eight suspects in three raids in Yala province on Monday on suspicion of plotting attacks on government buildings and killing officials.

The first five suspects, aged between 19 and 24, were nabbed during a raid on a house. Police found a list of security officials they planned to stalk and kill, flashlight and batteries, machetes, mobile phones and some Arabic-written documents, police said.

"We have much evidence showing that they were preparing for some assassinations," Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra told reporters yesterday.

"All the objects we seized may look harmless, but if we put everything together, it is obvious that they were planning some attacks," said Major General Tani Twidsi.

The arrests came after a remote-control bomb buried in a soccer field killed one soldier and wounded six others while they were playing a game on Sunday.

The bomb was set off as Thaksin was inaugurating a youth soccer league in Yala province.

A military report said the other two suspects, aged 31 and 39, were arrested while trying to attack an army patrol in Yala province with an explosive device that did not explode.

Soldiers found 4.5kg of C-4 explosive at the rubber plantation and 5kg of dynamite at the suspects' house yesterday, the report said.
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