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Published on September 9, 2007

The bullet-riddled bodies of Dusongthawa deputy village chief Areeyah Mae-sae and two men wanted in connection with the insurgency in the deep South were found on the side of a road in Yaha district yesterday, police said.

The two other men were identified by police as Hibroheng Leejeah and Sakariya Masupeh, both on the authorities' list of suspects linked to the ongoing violence in Yala province's Raman district.

According to an officer at Kotabaru Police Station who asked not to be named, the two men tried to kill Areeyah but the deputy village chief managed to return fire. The incident ended in the deaths of all three men.

Meanwhile, in Narathiwat's Sungai Padi district, a 200-strong special security task force surrounded Tambon Tohdeng and took 13 individuals in for questioning under the Emergency Law.

Two are believed to be active members of the new generation of insurgents, a source said.

One man with a warrant out for his arrest fled before authorities arrived.

A search of 70 homes in Tohdeng turned up one shotgun, an unspecified number of ammunition rounds and one kilogram of fertiliser that could be used to make bombs.

In Yala, Walitha Machai, 30, a rubber tapper in Tambon Bannang Sata, was shot dead at close range. Her body was found on the side of the road along with her motorbike.

In Hat Yai, Army chief General Sonthi Boonyaratglin urged Islamic leaders from 14 southern provinces to redouble efforts to solve the problems in the three southernmost provinces of Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat, as well as the Malay-speaking districts of Songkhla.

Waeduramae Mahmingji, chairman of the Islamic Committee of Pattani, called on the government to do more in the area of education for youths, suggesting a long-term solution was crucial to permanent peace. Virtually no one offered any short-term suggestions to end the killings that many observers and government officials believe could last for another generation before peace can be restored in the deep South, where about 3,000 have been killed in almost four years since the wave of violence erupted.

The Nation

Yala