Thai police obtain warrant for 3rd man for Aug. attacks

By CS Thana

BANGKOK (AA) - Thai police have obtained an arrest warrant for a third man suspected of involvement in a string of bomb attacks earlier this month in which four people died and more than 20 were wounded.

Deputy Police Chief Srivara Ransibrahmanakul told Anadolu Agency on Monday that the warrant, the third issued in connection with the bombings, was for Asman Gathemadi from the Muslim-majority province of Pattani.

"Those we have issued warrants for are known to authorities and have links to criminal activities in the three Southern provinces," he said.

Pattani is one of three provinces affected by a violent Muslim insurgency in the country's south.

Ransibrahmanakul said that Gathemadi has a previous warrant for his arrest in connection with the 2015 bombing of a shopping mall on the tourist resort of Koh Samui.

Southern insurgents have mostly waged attacks in the three southernmost provinces, but bombings in Hat Yai, in 2006 and 2014, and the bombing of Koh Samui in April 2015 have been attributed to them.

The warrant comes days before the Thai junta are due to meet with Mara Pattani, an umbrella organization representing southern insurgency factions, in Malaysia.

Junta chief-cum-Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha told reporters late Monday, however, that before any substantive talks could take place, he "must see a peaceful situation".

"How can we trust them when they can't even bring about peace?" he asked.

Bomb attacks across Thailand Aug. 11-12 left four people dead and more than 20 wounded.

The attacks targeted security officials and tourist sites.

Thailand's military government initially claimed that they were not the work of terrorists or insurgents but related to local politics.

The southern insurgency is rooted in a century-old ethno-cultural conflict between Malay Muslims living in the southern region and the Thai central state where Buddhism is considered the de-facto national religion.

Armed insurgent groups were formed in the 1960s after the then-military dictatorship tried to interfere in Islamic schools, but the insurgency faded in the 1990s.

In 2004, a rejuvenated armed movement -- composed of numerous local cells of fighters loosely grouped around an organization called the National Revolutionary Front or BRN -- emerged.

The confrontation is one of the deadliest low-intensity conflicts on the planet.