Suspected Muslim insurgents detonated three bombs at a tea stall and shopping area yesterday in insurgency-wracked southern Thailand, killing one person and wounding at least 71, police said.
It was the largest attack in months in Thailand’s restive south, which has been gripped by a Muslim insurgency since 2004.
The first bomb went off outside a tea shop across the street from a district office in Narathiwat Province, just as a meeting of about 300 village chiefs was ending, Narathiwat police chief Major General Surachai Suebsuk said.
The bomb was left inside a garbage bin, he said.
Minutes later, two bombs ripped through the parking lot of a nearby fruit market at about noon, at the start of the normally crowded lunch hour, Surachai said.
One of the bombs was planted in a car and the other in a motorcycle.
“Terrorist groups aimed to kill many people. That’s why they planted a car bomb near the fruit market that was busy with people,” Surachai said.
Cellphone signals were cut off in the area to prevent attackers from triggering new explosions by mobile phone, he said.
There were no immediate claims of responsibility for the blasts.
Violence in the south is usually blamed on Muslim insurgents. The southernmost provinces of Narathiwat, Yala and Pattani have been terrorized by regular attacks since early 2004, when a separatist movement flared after a lull of more than two decades.
Attacks generally take the form of drive-by shootings and small-scale bombings intended to frighten Buddhist residents into leaving the area. Suspected insurgents mainly target people seen as collaborating with the government, including soldiers, police, informants and civilians.
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