Bomb attacks in deep South raises fear

They said the bombs would have caused much more damages if it was better assembled.

One was a 15 kilogramme in weight and placed in front of the Park View Hotel in downtown Yala Saturday.

Yala went nearly two months without a bombing attack and the resumption has caused a great deal of frustration for the officials and the public in the city, he said.

The Yala bomb was hidden in a pickup truck that was parked in front of the Park View Hotel. It was not certain if the vehicle was stolen or the bomb was placed without the owner's knowledge.

Authorities believed the bomb was the work of Malay Muslim separatists looking to carve out a separate homeland in Thailand's three southernmost provinces.

The bomb attack came on the same day when insurgents shot dead a railway security guard and set off another bomb, killing one woman and injured 11 people, including two children and two police officers, in the province of Pattani.

The bomb was placed in front of a convenient store downtown Pattani Saturday afternoon. The female victim was identified as Seu-nee Wan-sulong, 35, a resident of Pattani's Tambon Sabarang. The bomb was tied to a motorbike and was estimated to be about five kilomgrammes in weight.