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Published on October 24, 2007

 The government was warned yesterday to monitor the deep South to prevent locals from embracing extremism - as urged by Osama bin Laden.

The chairman of the Southern Muslim Cultural Foundation, retired Police Maj-General Chamroon Den-udom, said the recent audio tape by bin Laden calling on fighters in Iraq to unite could also have an impact in the Malay-speaking South, where a new generation of separatists has taken up arms.

Chamroon did not elaborate as to how the deep South was heading towards extremism, but said that militants in the restive region could be lured to embrace bin Laden's message of unity, even though the call was aimed armed groups and tribal factions in Iraq - to let go of differences and unite against the US-led forces.

In the audio recording, entitled "A Message to the People of Iraq", bin Laden said: "The strength of faith is in the strength of the bond between Muslims and not that of a tribe or that of nationalism."

The recording was aired as Iraq's government reported violence had dropped by 70 per cent since the end of June, following a series of US-led offensives, the Al Jazeera website reported.

Iraq's wing of al-Qaeda is one of the groups fighting US-led forces and the Baghdad government, but bin Laden's followers have angered other Sunni groups and tribes through their interpretations of Islam and indiscriminate killing of civilians, Al Jazeera said.

In recent months Sunni tribal groups have formed alliances and worked with US forces to confront al-Qaeda in Iraq.

In a related story, a group of insurgents in a pick-up truck fired M16 automatic rifles at a group of villagers chatting in front of their houses in the evening.

Usmar Kwan, a 10-year-old girl in Narathiwat's Rangae district was shot dead, and seven others were injured.

Two women were also gunned down in the same district while riding their motorcycles down a back road.

Police identified the victims as Wiparat Manchan, 38, and Pimjai Kocharin, 30. They said the killings may have been a response to yesterday's raid on a nearby village where Rangers found M16 automatic rifle parts hidden in the area.

The same district also witnessed an arson attack on the passengers' waiting area near the Rangae railway station.

The two men behind the arson attack also left a fake bomb at the station before fleeing the scene.

The Nation