Recently in Thailand Category

"Revenge for the innocent." "Six killed in Thai shop attack," from Reuters, May 2 (thanks to Kenneth):

Suspected Muslim insurgents shot dead six people, including a three-year-old boy, in a convenience store in southern Thailand, police said, two days after peace talks in Malaysia ended in deadlock.

Four gunmen on motorcycles pulled up at the store in Pattani province, 500 metres from a military checkpoint, on Wednesday. "The attackers sprayed the shop with bullets before going in to finish off their victims. They left a note saying 'revenge for the innocent' before fleeing the scene," said a police officer in Pattani.

Five of the victims were Buddhists and one Muslim. The prime minister, Yingluck Shinawatra, called an emergency meeting with security agencies to discuss the violence.

The killings came after a second round of peace talks in the Malaysian capital, Kuala Lumpur, brokered by Malaysia, between Thai officials and leaders of the Barisan Revolusi Nasional, one of the oldest rebel groups operating in the south of the country. On Wednesday the military, which has 60,000 troops stationed in southern Thailand, rejected key BRN demands.

Resistance to Buddhist rule in the predominantly Muslim provinces of Yala, Pattani and Narathiwat has existed for decades but resurfaced violently in January 2004. Since then more than 5,300 people have been killed.

The three provinces were once part of a Malay Muslim sultanate until annexed by Thailand in 1909. Around 80% of the 1.8 million people living in the south are Malay-speaking Muslims. Many regard Buddhist rule from Bangkok and heavy military presence in the south as oppressive.

Because it is non-Muslim.

As as vivid indication of their commitment to peace, the Islamic jihadists murdered three Thai soldiers just as the peace talks began.

"Thai authorities, Muslim rebels launch peace talks," from the Associated Press, March 28 (thanks to Kenneth):

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) -- Thai authorities and Muslim separatist leaders started peace talks on Thursday aimed at ending almost a decade of unrest in the country's far south, as a new attack by suspected militants killed three Thai soldiers.

The secretary-general of Thailand's National Security Council, Lt. Gen. Paradorn Pattanathabutr, said he was "very happy" with the first meeting with the rebels led by the National Revolution Front, also known by the acronym BRN, and the Pattani United Liberation Organization, or PULO.

"We share the same goal, which is to reduce violence in the region. Both sides have agreed that we want peace in the area," Paradorn told reporters after a daylong meeting facilitated by Malaysia.

Violence has occurred nearly every day in Thailand's Muslim-dominated three southernmost provinces since the insurgency erupted in 2004, and more than 5,000 people have been killed. The militants have mainly targeted security forces and teachers, who are seen as representatives of the government of the predominantly Buddhist nation.

Muslims in the region, which was an independent Islamic sultanate until it was annexed by Thailand in the early 20th century, have long complained of discrimination by the central government in Bangkok, and the insurgents are thought to be fighting for autonomy. But the insurgency remains murky, with militants making no public pronouncements on their goals.

Paradorn said the rebels were asking Thai authorities to provide justice to the insurgents although he declined to give more details of their request.

The Thai authorities were also pushing for the militants to designate areas that could be free from attacks.

"I believe that today's talks will lead to an atmosphere that yields solutions, or yields progress that would result in solutions. The main issues are to reduce the violence," Paradorn said ahead of Thursday's meeting....

Good luck with that.

The motorcycle bomb didn't set out to kill the boy. Who did it? "Suspected militants," says AP. Militant about what? Six paragraphs down we learn that there has been an "Islamist insurgency." "Motorcycle bomb kills 1 boy, wounds 10 in Thailand's restive south," from the Associated Press, March 21 (thanks to Twostellas):

HAT YAI, Thailand - Police say suspected militants in Thailand's insurgency-plagued south have detonated a motorcycle bomb that killed a 9-year-old boy and wounded 10 other people.

Police Col. Tuanday Juthanan said Thursday the insurgents hid an improvised bomb on a motorcycle near a commercial district in the city of Pattani and set it off during lunch break.

He said the explosion killed a 9-year-old boy and wounded 10 other people, all civilians. He said the boy died while being rushed to a nearby hospital.

The explosion also damaged seven cars and three motorcycles that were parked in the area.

Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat are the only Muslim-dominated provinces in the predominantly Buddhist country.

More than 5,000 people have been killed since an Islamist insurgency erupted in the sub-region in 2004.

Killed by what? Or whom?

Will the Islamophobia never end? "Militants hunt Buddhists in Narathiwat," from the Bangkok Post, December 20 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

NARATHIWAT - A gang of Islamic militants burned down the Bacho Tambon Administration Organisation office on Thursday, after failing to find any Buddhist employees to kill.

Seven armed men stormed into the offices of the Bacho TAO in Bacho district shortly after noon.

Abdulwaha Dulayapinij, the office’s chief administrator, told the police he and seven other employees were just leaving for lunch.

''One of them fired a gun into the air and ordered everyone to stay put in Yawi [a Malay dialect spoken by Muslims in the South] and then asked if there were any Buddhist Thais working here,” Mr Abdulwaha said.

“I told him there were none, and the outlaw was upset and said I had lied to him.”

Mr Abdulwaha then explained there was a female Buddhist Thai civil servant identified as Suchada sae Li working at the TAO as a community development officer, level 3, but she was on leave.

Upset with the answer, two of the gunmen emptied a five-litre container of gasoline into the archive and equipment storage rooms, set fire to it, and then fled the scene.

Staff, villagers and a local disaster relief team tried to put out the fire, but the blaze spread quickly and destroyed the whole building.

Mr Abdulwaha said it appeared the assailants wanted to kill Ms Suchada who was the only Buddhist official at the Bacho TAO, and had planned to use the gasoline to burn her body....

Will the Islamophobia never end? "Insurgents kill 7, including 11-month-old girl, in attacks in southern Thailand," from The Associated Press, December 11 (thanks to Kenneth):

PATTANI, Thailand - A baby girl was among seven people killed Tuesday by suspected Islamist separatists, police said, as a nearly 9-year-old insurgency in southern Thailand that has killed thousands of people shows no signs of letting up.

Five people were killed and another four wounded in a drive-by shooting at a tea shop in Narathiwat province's Ra-ngae district, said local police chief Col. Jiradej Prasawang. The dead included 11-month-old Efahni Samoh, while the wounded included a 10-month-old boy, Muhammad Yaena.

Jiradej said the shop may have been targeted by the gunmen, who were firing AK-47 assault rifles, because the owner is a village official. Officials and teachers, as representatives of the state, are prime targets for the insurgents, whose terror tactics are also thought to be aimed at scaring Buddhist residents fleeing the region.

In a separate incident, five attackers shot dead a principal and a teacher at a school in neighbouring Pattani province's Mayo district before stealing a pickup truck as they fled, said Mayo police chief Col. Kong-art Suwannakham. The total number of school personnel killed in such attacks is now 157, according to the regional teachers association.

More than 5,000 people have been killed in the three Muslim-dominated southernmost provinces of Buddhist-dominated Thailand since an Islamist insurgency erupted in January 2004.

Meanwhile, the Brussels-based International Crisis Group counsels surrender:

"Successive governments have opted to muddle through Southeast Asia's most violent internal conflict, deploying tens of thousands of security forces and spending billions of dollars to little effect," the Brussels-based International Crisis Group think-tank said Tuesday as it released a report on the conflict.

"Insurgents have withstood and adapted to the military's tactics, growing more proficient and daring in the process," it said. "While there is greater pressure on leaders to reduce violence and seek a resolution, political infighting and bureaucratic inertia continue to impinge on a comprehensive approach."

The group recommended that Thailand's government "reverse the militarization of the southernmost provinces, lift the Draconian security laws and end the security forces' impunity, all of which help stimulate the insurgency."

Pressing on toward final victory. "Eleven Dead in Thai Militant Attacks: Police," from the Jakarta Globe, October 9 (thanks to S.B.):

Suspected Muslim militants have shot dead 11 people including three paramilitary rangers in a single day of bloodshed in Thailand’s insurgency-plagued deep south, police said Tuesday.

The rangers were ambushed while traveling in a pick-up truck on Monday in Pattani province in the Muslim-majority border region, where an eight-year conflict has claimed thousands of lives.

On the same day, four Buddhist rubber tappers died on their way to work in two separate gun attacks in Pattani, while a pair of Muslim men were killed in a drive-by shooting in neighboring Yala province, police said.

Two vegetable vendors were also shot dead in Songkhla province, which had been relatively untouched by the violence until a number of attacks this year, including a series of car bombs in April that left 15 people dead.

A complex insurgency calling for greater autonomy has plagued Thailand’s far south near the border with Malaysia since 2004, claiming more than 5,300 lives, both Buddhist and Muslim, with near daily bomb or gun attacks.

The authorities said in August they were holding informal peace talks with some Muslim insurgent groups, in an apparent policy reversal that followed a spike in attacks.

“Some militant groups don’t want a peaceful solution so they look for an opportunity to terrorize people,” southern army spokesman Colonel Pramote Prom-in told AFP on Tuesday.

“We’re trying to find measures to prevent this kind of violence but still haven’t succeeded,” he added.

Try more origami.

The militants are not thought to be part of a global jihad movement but are rebelling against a history of perceived discrimination against ethnic Malay Muslims by successive Thai governments and alleged rights abuses by the army.

Of course!

And the local authorities are on their knees, pleading with the local Muslims to trust them. Such is the topsy-turvy state of the world today. "Suspected Muslim insurgents shoot grenades at fair in southern Thailand, 30 hurt," from the Associated Press, September 30 (thanks to Maxwell):

PATTANI, Thailand — Thai police believe Islamist insurgents fired grenades at a fair in southern Thailand, injuring 30 people, in anger over government efforts to win over local Muslim religious leaders.

Police Lt. Col. Krajang Raknarong said Sunday the attackers fired grenades at a security checkpoint near the trade fair in Narathiwat province’s Bajoh district on Saturday. Thirty people were hurt, four seriously, when two grenades exploded near fair booths.

At least five people were killed in southern Thailand on Saturday in separate shooting attacks blamed by police on the insurgents.

The local district chief and security officials met religious elders earlier Saturday as part of official efforts to win the trust of local Muslims.

The local Muslims should be the ones trying to win the trust of the local district chief and security officials. After all, they're the ones doing the killing. But as always, they play the victim card very skillfully.

Time to break out more origami. Or maybe some Sharia blasphemy laws. Yeah, that'll fix it. "Muslims stage peaceful film protest in Bangkok," from the Associated Press, September 18 (thanks to Benedict):

BANGKOK (AP) -- Police say 400 people have protested peacefully outside the U.S. Embassy in Bangkok against an anti-Islam video produced in the United States that has sparked demonstrations in many Muslim countries.

About 700 police were on hand Tuesday to maintain order for the demonstration, organized by a group called the International Al Quds Federation of Thailand. The group had called for a peaceful protest on its Facebook page.

Protesters carried signs and banners saying "We love Prophet Muhammad" and "Stop insulting our religion," and chanted "Down with America" and "Down with Israel."

A protest leader, Sa-id Sulaiman Husseini, said the world could become a "sea of fire" if the American government does not stop the distribution of the film.

5,206 people have been killed and 9,137 wounded in the Thai jihad, and counting. "Muslim separatists launch wave of bomb attacks in Thailand," by Surapan Boonthanom in the Independent, August 31 (thanks to Twostellas):

SUSPECTED Muslim separatists launched a wave of bomb attacks in Thailand's south on Friday in a rare show of coordination in a usually low-level insurgency in the predominantly Buddhist country.

Police say "bomb-like" devices were found in at least 60 locations in Narathiwat and Pattani, two of three mainly Muslim provinces bordering mainly Muslim Malaysia, along with scores of Malaysian flags.

Most of the devices were fake, but at least a dozen exploded and wounded two soldiers.

A shadowy separatist insurgency by ethnic Malays resurfaced in January 2004, after simmering for decades. Since then, 5,206 people have been killed and 9,137 wounded, according to Deep South Watch, an organisation that monitors the violence....

The coordination and scale of Friday's action were "extremely rare" and intended as a rebuttal of the government's handling of the eight-year conflict, said Srisompop Jitpiromsri of Deep South Watch, who is also a lecturer at Prince of Songkla University in Pattani.

Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat have seen almost daily gun fights and bomb attacks since January 2004. The three provinces were once part of an independent Malay Muslim sultanate until annexed by Thailand in 1909.

The placing of Malaysian flags was intended to antagonise the Thai government and cause friction with Malaysia, Pramote Prom-in, an official at the Southern Internal Security Operations Command told a news conference in Narathiwat.

He asked authorities to be vigilant and said the attacks would not affect Thai-Malaysian relations.

The attacks came on the anniversary of Malaysia's independence from British rule.

Leaked television footage of a fatal roadside ambush by militants on four Thai soldiers a month ago triggered widespread public scrutiny of the government's handling of the long-neglected south.

The government had ruled out peace talks but the government had a change of heart and said this month talks were under way.

Successive governments have spent more than 160 billion baht ($5 billion) over the past eight years to quell the violence....

And let's not forget the origami.

There is a "surge in violence" in Thailand since Ramadan began. Somehow these Misunderstanders of Islam didn't get the memo that Ramadan is a time to "reconcile differences and seek peace." And oddly enough, they misunderstand Islam and Ramadan in exactly the same way as the Muslims in Bulgaria who somehow got the crazy idea that "Ramadan is a month of holy war and death for Allah. It is a month for fighting the enemies of Allah and God's messenger, the Jews and their American facilitators." What an odd coincidence!

"Militants shoot dead 4 soldiers in restive Thai south," from AFP, July 28 (thanks to S.B.):

BANGKOK: Militants shot dead four soldiers and wounded two others early on Saturday in Thailand's volatile south, an army spokesman said, as a surge in violence since the start of Ramzan continued.

The group of six soldiers were attacked as they patrolled a road in the Mayo district of Pattani province.

"About 20 armed militants on three pick up trucks opened fire at a team of soldiers once they get close to them," Colonel Pramote Prom-in, southern army spokesman, said.

Pramote said four soldiers were killed in the attack and two more were wounded as they returned fire.

The incident came after a roadside bomb killed five policemen in nearby Yala province on Wednesday....

Authorities had warned that militants were likely to step-up attacks during the Islamic holy month.

So many misunderstanders of Islam!

Somehow these Misunderstanders of Islam didn't get the memo that Ramadan is a time to "reconcile differences and seek peace." And oddly enough, they misunderstand Islam and Ramadan in exactly the same way as the Muslims in Bulgaria who somehow got the crazy idea that "Ramadan is a month of holy war and death for Allah. It is a month for fighting the enemies of Allah and God's messenger, the Jews and their American facilitators." What an odd coincidence!

"Muslims begin Ramadan fast; bombs hit Thai south," by Niniek Karmini for the Associated Press, July 21 (thanks to JCB):

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — Muslims have begun fasting for the start of the Ramadan holy month in Indonesia, Malaysia and elsewhere around Asia, but the somber occasion was marred in Buddhist-dominated Thailand by two bomb blasts that killed one person and injured seven....

Muslims in Thailand also began Ramadan on Friday, while Malaysians began Saturday. India, Pakistan and Bangladesh were to start Saturday or Sunday.

The Muslim holy month devoted to dawn-to-dusk fasting, prayers and good deeds culminates with the three-day holiday of Eid al-Fitr.

Muslims believe God revealed the first verses of the Quran to the Prophet Muhammad during Ramadan, which starts with the sighting of the new moon. The Muslim lunar calendar moves back through the seasons, so Ramadan starts 11 days earlier each year under the Western calendar.

The holy month started ominously in southern Thailand, the region where most Thai Muslims live and where an insurgency has claimed thousands of lives. The car bombing started fires at shops and residences and sent black smoke wafting from a row of four-story buildings in a commercial area of Sungai Kolok in Narathiwat province.

Seven people were injured, including four who were briefly trapped on the roof of a burning building, said police Col. Maitree Chimcherd. He said Muslim insurgents hid the homemade bomb in a pickup truck parked in front of a computer store.

On Thursday night, a roadside bomb killed a villager and wounded his companion while they were hunting for squirrels in the woods in Yala province, said police Col. Wichai Jaengsakul....

Soldiers who were attending a briefing in the schoolyard were targeted. Soldiers guard schools because the jihadis often target teachers. So they hit the soldiers because they want to be able to murder the teachers unhindered. Will the Islamophobia never end?

"Suspected Islamist insurgents kill 3 Thai troops," from the Associated Press, June 16 (thanks to Kenneth):

Suspected Muslim separatists have killed three soldiers and wounded six others in an attack in southern Thailand.

Police Col. Samneang Luejeangkam says the attackers hurled a grenade into a school in Yala province's Krongpinang district on Saturday while soldiers were taking part in a daily briefing in the schoolyard. Soldiers guard state schools in the area because teachers are often targets of the separatists, who regard them as representatives of the government.

More than 5,000 people have been killed in Thailand's three southernmost provinces since an Islamist insurgency flared in 2004. Muslim residents have long complained of being treated as second-class citizens in the predominantly Buddhist nation.

Looks as if the non-Muslim citizens have more to complain about.

Imagine the international outcry that would ensue if someone threw a grenade at anyone or anything from inside a church. But this will get no attention. "Muslim man arrested for alleged bomb attack in Narathiwat," from The Nation, May 14 (thanks to Twostellas):

A Muslim man was arrested Monday for allegedly lobbing a grenade at a police road checkpoint Sunday night, injuring five civilians, a policeman and a paramilitary ranger.

Police said Hanafi Sedmahamad was arrested after witnesses identified him at the bomb attacker.

Feeds from a security camera showed that a grenade was hurled from inside a mosque to the security checkpoint at the Clock Tower in Muang district.

Watch what happens now: the mainstream media and the Muslims in Thailand will claim victim status any and every time Buddhists defend themselves from jihad violence.

"Thailand’s Buddhists Take Up Arms Against Insurgency," from Newsweek, April 16 (thanks to David):

A few hours’ drive from the white-sand beaches of Phuket—one of the world’s top tourist destinations—a deadly insurgency is terrorizing Thailand’s south. The separatist movement, made up of mostly ethnic-Malay Muslims, roils the region with daily threats of sectarian violence and has prompted many Buddhist villagers, and even some monks, to take up arms in self-defense. A series of coordinated bombings across two provinces on March 31 alone left 14 dead and hundreds injured.

The conflict has been gaining steam over the past eight years, even as the international community pays little attention. Since 2004, drive-by shootings, IED bombings, and point-blank assassinations have claimed some 5,000 lives in the country’s three restive southernmost provinces that border Malaysia, making the insurgency one of the world’s deadliest.

The insurgent groups rally around the belief that the provinces—where ethnic Malay Muslims are the majority—should be independent of Thailand, where more than 90 percent of the rest of the population is Buddhist. The insurgents’ preferred targets are Buddhists, especially those in the security forces or government, though they also kill fellow Muslims accused of not aligning with the separatist cause. They claim to have cells in 90 percent of southern villages; the boast, say security experts, is legitimate.

Even as a force of some 60,000 soldiers and police patrol the area, the insurgents have succeeded in spreading their network across the disputed territory, cultivating an atmosphere of perpetual insecurity for Buddhist communities living there. “First Muslim people came to our village and asked to buy our land,” says Suphorn Nison, a soft-spoken Buddhist in his mid-40s. “But they became less diplomatic when Buddhist people declined to leave.” The following month, Nison says, two men entered a convenience store operated by Nison’s father and executed him with two shots to his head. Nison claims the gunmen were Muslim and intended to send a stern message. Most Buddhists in his village left, but those who stayed, including Nison, formed a neighborhood-security force.

That was in 2006. Today such community-defense units are ubiquitous in Thailand’s south. Nison carries a revolver with him at all times. Many other Buddhists have also armed themselves, including a demure 38-year-old teacher, an acquaintance of Nison’s, who prefers a light Glock .22. While village-defense forces, or Chor Ror Bor, also operate in Muslim communities, they are often given fewer and inferior weapons than their Buddhist counterparts, and don’t receive the same level of support from the Thai Army and police, says Rungrawee Chalermsripinyorat, an analyst at the International Crisis Group, a nonprofit that studies ways to prevent conflicts....

Note the careful and extensive planning that went into this carnage. As one jihadist put it, "We love death. You love your life!"

Pamela Geller has on-site reports from Thailand here. "South Thailand Bombings Leave 14 Dead, 340 Injured," from the Jakarta Globe, April 1:

Hat Yai, Thailand. Suspected Muslim insurgents staged the most deadly coordinated attacks in years in Thailand’s restive south, killing 14 people and injuring 340 on Saturday with car bombs that targeted shoppers and a high-rise hotel frequented by foreign tourists.

A first batch of explosives planted inside a parked pickup truck ripped through an area of restaurants and shops in a busy area of Yala city, a commercial hub of Thailand’s southern provinces, district police chief Col. Kritsada Kaewchandee said.

About 20 minutes later, just as onlookers gathered at the blast site, a second car bomb exploded, causing the majority of casualties. Eleven people were killed and 110 wounded.

More than 5,000 people have been killed in Thailand’s three southernmost provinces of Narathiwat, Pattani and Yala since an Islamist insurgency flared in January 2004.

“This is the worst attack in the past few years,” said Col. Pramote Promin, deputy spokesman of a regional security agency.

“The suspected insurgents were targeting people’s lives,” he said. They chose “a bustling commercial area, so they wanted to harm people.”

Most attacks are small bombings or drive-by shootings that target soldiers, police and symbols of authority, but suspected insurgents have also staged large attacks in commercial areas.

A blast also occurred on Saturday at a high-rise hotel in the city of Hat Yai, in the nearby province of Songkhla. Officials had initially attributed that blast to a gas leak, saying it was unrelated to the attacks blamed on insurgents. But after inspecting the hotel’s underground parking lot, authorities found a severely damaged sedan and a hole created by the explosion’s impact.

The midday explosion at the 405-room Lee Gardens Plaza Hotel, where many Malaysian and Singaporean tourists spend their weekends, killed three people and caused about 230 injuries, mostly from smoke inhalation, said a police officer, Lt. Puwadon Wiriyawarangkun.

They're not sure which ones, but they know it involved Misunderstanders of the Religion of Peace. "Three deadly explosions hit Yala in southern Thailand, officials say," from the BBC, March 31 (thanks to A):

At least eight people have been killed in three explosions in the southern Thai province of Yala, officials say.

Yala Governor Dejrat Simsiri said the blasts occurred over 10 minutes at around midday (06:00 BST) in the commercial district of Yala city.

He said two of the bombs were hidden in motorcycles and the third in a car.

Thailand's three southern-most provinces have been plagued by bomb attacks and shootings since 2004, when a separatist campaign reignited.

"We are not sure which group of suspected Muslim insurgents were behind this but we are looking," Mr Dejrat said.

The Associated Press and Reuters news agencies put the death toll from Saturday's bombings at eight, with around 70 wounded. AFP quoted a nurse in the emergency unit of Yala provincial hospital as saying nine people had died.

"There are nine dead now and 112 injured people sent to our hospital," the hospital worker told AFP.
Map of Thailand

Thai police told AFP a policeman had also been injured in a separate motorcycle attack in Mae Lan in neighbouring Pattani province.

Thai officials said another explosion on Saturday - at a hotel in the city of Hat Yai, Songkhla province - was due to a gas leak and unrelated to the attacks, Associated Press reported.

More than 4,300 people have been killed in the violence in southern Thailand. As of 2011, the Thai army had 60,000 forces stationed in the region to tackle the insurgency.

Thailand annexed the three provinces - Narathiwat, Yala and Pattani - in 1902, but the majority of people there are Muslim and speak a Malay dialect, in contrast with the Buddhists in the rest of the country who speak Thai.

Critics accuse the government of failing to address the grievances of these residents.

Of course. It's always the other guy's fault.

If there is any good news here, it is how thoroughly this plot has unraveled. If there are going to be jihadists, thank goodness for dumb ones. "Thailand names sixth Bangkok bomb suspect," from BBC News, February 20 (thanks to Kenneth):

A court in Thailand has issued an arrest warrant for a sixth suspect over an alleged Iranian bomb plot to attack Israeli diplomats in Bangkok.

The man was named by police as Norouzi Shaya Ali Akbar, 57, wanted on charges of possessing and making explosives.

Three men are in custody in Thailand and Malaysia and two other people, a man and a woman, are also being sought after last week's blasts in Bangkok.

Thai police took one suspect back to the scene of the first blast on Monday.

Wearing handcuffs and a bullet-proof vest, Mohamad Khazaei was brought to a house used by the suspects in central Bangkok.

An explosion there last Tuesday sparked a dramatic attempt by the Iranians to flee the country, during which a second suspect was badly injured by his own bomb.

A third suspect managed to board a plane to Kuala Lumpur, where he was detained and is facing a Thai extradition request.

The other two suspects are Iranian woman Leila Rohani, who is believed to be back in Iran, and a man of unknown nationality, who was named by police on Friday as Nikkhahfard Javad.

Thai deputy national police chief Pansiri Prapawat said Norouzi Shaya Ali Akbar had been filmed by a CCTV camera leaving a house rented by the suspects.

He is thought to have fled to Iran, the police official was quoted as saying by AFP news agency.

Security analysts have linked the Bangkok blasts, in which four other people were injured, to two attacks targeting Israeli diplomats in India and Georgia last Monday.

Israel has accused Tehran of being behind all three attacks while Tehran has denied any involvement.

This would tend to discredit Iran's claim that Israel attacked itself in Georgia and India. Thailand, of course, has had its own ongoing case involving Hizballah bomb plots. "Suspected Iranian national maimed by own bomb in Bangkok," from Haaretz, February 14:

A man thought to be Iranian was seriously wounded in Bangkok on Tuesday when a bomb he was carrying exploded and blew one of his legs off, police and a government spokeswoman said.

Shortly before, there had been an explosion in a house the man was renting in the Ekamai area of central Bangkok, government spokeswoman Thitima Chaisaeng told reporters.

A taxi driver told Thai television the man had then thrown a bomb in front of his car before running off, injuring him slightly.

Thitima said police had tried to move in and arrest the man after blast by the taxi. According to the Bangkok Post, he threw another grenade at the police that hit a tree and bounced back toward him and exploded, which caused him to lose both his legs.

"The police have control of the situation. It is thought that the suspect might be storing more explosives inside his house," Thitima said, adding that, according to an initial police report, the man was thought to be Iranian.

Five people were wounded as a result of Tuesday's attack.

A senior Israeli official said Tuesday that Thailand police believe that the bombing that took place in Bangkok earlier in the day was a botched terror attack....

Since Atris Hussein almost certainly believes that "there is not a catastrophe in the world that is not the handiwork of the Jews," this paranoid lunacy probably seems perfectly reasonable to him.

"Swede arrested in Thai terror probe claims he was set up by Mossad," from Fox News, January 19 (thanks to Kenneth):

BANGKOK -- A Swedish man of Lebanese descent accused of planning a terror attack in Bangkok says he is innocent and claims Israeli intelligence service Mossad set him up.

Atris Hussein, 47, who was charged Monday with violating a weapons control law after a large amount of fertilizer and ammonium nitrate -- which can be used to make a bomb -- was found in a property he rented, told Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet he was, "100 percent innocent."

"A lot of the material police found in my storage facility had been placed there, most likely by the Israeli intelligence service Mossad," Hussein told the newspaper from Bangkok Remand Prison, where he is being held.

The father of four, who worked as a hairdresser in Gothenburg for 10 years before moving back to his native Lebanon, claims he was only involved in regular business activities involving the import and export of ice packs, paper and fans.

"The [ice packs] contain ammonia," Hussein said. "We've never traded in fertilizer. It must have been placed in our storage facility by someone, probably Mossad."

However, Thai police believe Hussein has links to the Iranian-backed, Lebanon-based militant group Hizbollah. They claim Hussein told officers that he and another man arrived in Thailand late last year with plans to stage an attack in Bangkok.

He allegedly told police that the bomb plot was called off when authorities caught wind of it.

Hussein, who used to run a business selling miniature trees, denies all the allegations and believes he was singled out because he is a Shiite Muslim and because of his political beliefs.

"I voted for the Social Democrats when I lived in Sweden," he said. "That may have made me look suspicious in the eyes of Mossad. They had an eye on me."

As one astute commenter observed the other day, surely this is about all that Israeli occupation of Thailand. An update on this story. "Thai police find large cache of bomb-making materials," from BBC News, January 16 (thanks to The Religion of Peace):

Police in Thailand say they have found a large supply of materials for making bombs, following the detention of a suspect with alleged links to Hezbollah.

The suspect led police to a building containing more than 300 boxes of fertiliser and ammonium nitrate.

The raid follows the terror alert issued by the US and Israel warning citizens to avoid tourist sites.

Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra said that the situation was under control.

The suspect, who was detained last week, is said to be a Lebanese man with a Swedish passport.

Police say the man has links to Hezbollah, a Lebanon-based Shia Islamist movement backed by Syria and Iran that the US considers to be a terrorist organisation.

A second suspect is also believed to have left Thailand.

A police spokesman told local media that the chemicals were going to be shipped out of Thailand for use in an unspecified third country.

The US embassy still has not lifted the warning it issued on Friday stating that Americans should "exercise caution when visiting public areas where large groups of Western tourists gather".