After more than a decade of conflict, the violence in Thailand’s deep south takes a toll on people’s mental well-being. Narathiwat, Thailand – Cholathee Charoenchol, a 51-year-old teacher at Tanjung primary school in Thailand’s southern Narathiwat province, waited patiently in his cafeteria on January 23, 2013. It was lunchtime, and the …
HAT YAI, Thailand (AP) — A roadside bomb exploded in Thailand’s insurgency-plagued south Wednesday, killing two teachers and wounding three other people, police said. Suspected insurgents detonated the explosive as a car carrying three teachers passed by a hospital in Chanae district in Narathiwat province, Police Col. Patta Madawah said. …
The Thai government and Muslim separatists in the south of the country have announced they will stop fighting each other during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan. The conflict has killed more than 5,000 people in the last decade. The agreement is the first major step since February, when the …
BANGKOK — Suspected Muslim rebels in southern Thailand killed eight soldiers in a roadside bomb attack on Saturday, days after the government rejected demands for a ceasefire over the Islamic holiday of Ramadan starting next month. Thailand is a predominantly Buddhist country and resistance to central government rule in the …
“Children and women will not be spared,” warned the leaflet. It wasn’t an idle threat. On May 1, Islamist insurgents from the Pejuang Kemerdekaan Fatoni — the Fatoni or Pattani Fighters — opened fire on villagers outside a grocery store in Thailand’s restive deep south. A 2-year-old boy was killed …
Six people, including a young child, have been killed in southern Thailand after a gun attack at a village shop, police say. At least four gunmen fired bullets at the shop in Pattani province before escaping on motorbikes. The attack comes days after a second round of peace talks between …
(Reuters) – Thailand’s national security chief said on Tuesday that talks between rebel leaders and his government aimed at ending a bloody insurgency in the south had not broken down, despite the rejection of rebel demands for self-government. Violence has persisted in the three Muslim-dominated provinces of Pattani, Yala and …
(Reuters) – Leaders of a Muslim rebel group in southern Thailand said they will press for an independent state and made other demands that are likely to scupper a second round of peace talks, which started in Malaysia on Monday. Resistance to Bangkok’s Buddhist rule has existed for decades but …
Thai villagers hang cages as they gather for a bird-singing contest in Narathiwat, Thailand. via Images from around the world – The Washington Post.
BANGKOK (AP) — Thailand’s government has launched the first Malay-language television channel geared toward the insurgency-plagued south’s Muslim-majority audience. Muslims in Thailand’s southernmost Muslim-dominated provinces of Yala, Pattani and Narathiwat say they are treated as second-class citizens by predominantly Buddhist Thai authorities. More than 5,000 people have been killed there …
PATTANI, Thailand (AP) — Teachers in a violence-wracked southern Thai province said Monday that they are shutting down all primary schools there until the government can guarantee their safety from attacks by Muslim insurgents. Boonsom Tongsriplai, the head of the region’s teachers’ association, said that Pattani province’s 332 schools would …
NARATHIWAT, Thailand — As the violence-plagued provinces of southern Thailand continue to struggle with a shadowy insurgency, the restive region is battling a new enemy: a drug cocktail made from a local leaf that is seducing the young. The drug, kratom, is far less debilitating than the methamphetamines and heroin …