BANGKOK - Thailand's own September 11 may be
moving closer, accelerated by the government's tough but
inept policy that is alienating moderate Muslims in the
deep south, possibly opening the door to foreign hands.
A brutal response by disgruntled Muslims to last week's
carnage would severely test relations with Buddhist
Thailand and Muslim-majority neighbors Indonesia and
Malaysia, potentially fracturing the Association of
Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
A devastating
attack by Thailand's embittered Malay Muslims, whether
insurgents dreaming of independence or people fed up
with government maltreatment, is increasingly likely
after security forces killed more than 80 Muslim
protesters in Narathiwat province on October 25. That
followed the deaths of 32 Muslims, some armed, when
soldiers stormed Narathiwat's Krue Se Mosque on April
28, the deadliest day of violence since fighting began
in the troubled southern provinces in early January.
"There are now more reasons to attack Bangkok
and other places and more reasons to unify the various
militant groups. I believe they have talked about [that]
in the past. This situation makes it much more likely,"
said Dr Panitan Wattanayagorn, a national-security
specialist at Chulalongkorn University. "It is already
difficult to predict; much more difficult is to prevent
it from happening. You can't underestimate them
anymore."
A powerful car bomb seems well within
their reach. This year insurgents have used high
explosives, fertilizer and mobile-phone triggers in
bombs. Just last Thursday a 10-kilogram bomb containing
dynamite and ammonium nitrate was defused in Narathiwat
town. Inspiration abounds, from the September 11, 2001,
terror attacks to the Madrid train bombings last March.
A separatist group, the Pattani United Liberation
Organization, promises an outrage.
Despite a
heavy military presence this year, assassinations,
bombings and arson have increased in Thailand's southern
border provinces. Intelligence seems poor, which is
hardly surprising given the poor relations between the
state and the people. Against such a background security
forces have their work cut out in intercepting a major
attack.
Even pro-government Muslims are losing
faith. "People are extremely angry, even very well-known
Muslims who have sided with the government all along,"
said Senator Kraisak Choonhaven, who joined a Senate
fact-finding team visiting the region on Thursday. "It's
really getting out of hand."
Cynicism greeted a
government promise of an impartial investigation into
the incident. Government reassurances that troops did
not shoot at protesters outside Tak Bai police station,
where a demonstration on October 25 demanded the release
of six village defense volunteers held on suspicion of
stealing weapons, fell flat when contradictory
photographs appeared. Hundreds of those detained in a
security forces dragnet were passers-by. After nearly a
week, the last batch of those detainees returned home on
Sunday.
"Apparently the government thinks all
the people are organized insurgents - that's why they
arrested 1,200 people, even though hundreds were
passers-by," said Kraisak. "I saw children of 14 or 15
years in detention in military camps in Pattani and in
Songkhla. They should be separated from the group and
not treated as terrorists as such."
Holding
innocents will further alienate Muslim-majority
Narathiwat, Pattani and Yala provinces, abutting the
Malaysian border, where relations with the Bangkok
government have plunged since the implementation of a
harsh policy last year after attacks, attributed to a
shadowy mix of spent insurgents and cliques jockeying
for contracts and influence, began climbing in 2002.
As relations worsen, foreign terrorists seem
poised to gain a foothold, if they have not already.
Last year's arrest in the south of a handful of suspects
from Jemaah Islamiah (JI), a group determined to carve a
fundamentalist-Islamic state in Southeast Asia, and JI
operations chief Hambali near Bangkok indicate that
easy-going Thailand is at least a place for them to lie
low and plot their regional campaign.
Intriguingly, the local press reports that about
20 bodies were buried unidentified when nobody came
forward to claim them after last week's incident. Given
the fear prevalent in the area, families may have been
too scared to admit a son was either watching or
demonstrating. Less likely, though hard to rule out, is
that the bodies were those of foreign rank-and-file
militants.
Arbitrary detention, disappearances -
most notably that of prominent Muslim human-rights
lawyer Somchai Neelahphaijit - and extrajudicial
killings have become common. It now may be impossible
for Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra's government to
repair relations.
"I think the government has
lost all credibility among Muslims nationwide and many
Buddhist Thais as well. These methods of suppression
[go] against people's constitutional right to
demonstrate," said Kraisak.
These provinces have
always had a somewhat tenuous link with Thailand; they
comprised the Kingdom of Pattani until early in the 20th
century when Siam, as Thailand was then known, subsumed
them. Rebellion has been festering ever since,
especially during periods of heightened Buddhist Thai
nationalism, which has been resurgent over the past few
years.
Despite initial moves at separation, over
the decades, separatist dreams waned as the Muslim
population, including ethnic Malays, began slowly
integrating to a degree into Thai society.
"Even
Malay-speaking Muslims have acquired a sense of
belonging to Thailand over the last few decades. Many go
to work in Malaysia but they listen to Thai music, read
Thai magazines and are crazy about Thai soap operas.
Thailand is home for them, they have multiplex
personality; Thailand is their home," said Michiko
Tsuneda, a University of Wisconsin cultural
anthropologist studying Thai-Malay Muslim communities in
southern Thailand.
However, like other ethnic
minorities, they face discrimination from some elements
of the Thai state in policy and practice. For Muslims,
that feels sharper at a time when Muslims worldwide
perceive persecution by non-Muslims, accentuating the
problem and giving it an international tinge.
"Until recently it has very much been an ethnic
issue, but this global trend of seeing conflicts along
religious lines is affecting the southern Thailand
situation, making religion a bigger issue," said
Tsuneda.
Despite heavy criticism from home and
abroad in the wake of the protesters' deaths, the
government is in no mood for going easy. Thaksin argues
that a soft policy would be tantamount to acceding to
terrorists. And according to the English-language
Bangkok Post daily, 4th Army commander
Lieutenant-General Pisarn Wattanawongkeeree vows he will
continue taking tough action against Muslim militants
wreaking havoc in the south.
Tough action,
though, is fracturing religious harmony, deepening
divisions between Muslims, who believe the state
discriminates against them, and Buddhists, who feel
Muslims are attacking them.
"It could further
destabilize and demoralize the community, which is
already on the edge," said Panitan, the
national-security specialist. "The Thai Muslim and Thai
Buddhist communities may come into conflict with each
other, because of rumors and speculation, breaking down
of order."
Such inter-communal conflict is
moving closer. Expectations are high of a sharp rise in
attacks on officials, security forces, Buddhist monks
and even ordinary citizens after last week's deaths.
M16-toting troops accompanied processions marking the
end of Buddhist Lent in Narathiwat a few days after the
Tak Bai incident.
That so many unarmed detainees
died while trussed and herded like pigs has caught the
world's attention, especially that of Muslim countries.
"The events speak for themselves: the demonstrations in
Bangladesh, Indonesia and elsewhere, protest letters
pouring in from Islamic groups in the region,
expressions of concern from Indonesian and Malaysia,"
said Kraisak.
If the situation does not improve
fast, the governments of Muslim Indonesian and Malaysia
will come under increasing pressure from their citizens
to take forceful positions. Mahathir Mohamad, Malaysia's
provocative retired prime minister, compared the
situation in Thailand's border provinces to that in
Palestine.
"They are already expressing their
concerns and sympathy. To a lesser extent the
international community is already involved in this by
commentating and asking for explanations," said Panitan.
That will jar with ASEAN's doctrine of not
interfering in domestic affairs. Thaksin, who does not
take criticism kindly, will not take their interest
lightly either. A major attack causing heavy casualties
will radically alter the situation. It could be the
spark that would light an inter-communal fire.
"That would probably drive the state and people
to act harder against the Muslims. Even now people in
the capital believe the situation is driven by Muslim
separatists, which is not the case. There are many
factors involved," said Tsuneda.
Should hundreds
die in such an operation, possibly compounded by fights
with Buddhist neighbors, a Muslim exodus for Malaysia is
not unlikely. That will leave Indonesia and Malaysia
balancing their citizens' demands for action against
maintaining ASEAN's façade of unity.
If the
government and security forces learn new tactics and
strategies fast, reconciliation is possible, but time is
running out. Open ears, negotiation and compromise are
the best weapons for winning back the people's
confidence; tough talk and tough tactics rarely prevail
in civil conflicts. Sadly, as things stand, the only
certainty is more mayhem, blood, and death.
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