Page 2 of 2 No peace tomorrow for South Thailand
By Anthony Davis
Thirdly, the neat geographic dichotomy between an "old guard" in Malaysia and a "new generation" in Thailand is also misplaced. For reasons that have much to do with Malaysian government manipulation of the Pattani movement in the 1980s and 1990s, BRN Coordinate has stressed consistently the importance of rooting its struggle inside Thailand.
Until he fled in late 2004, Sapaeing Basor - presumably "old guard" at 77 - was resident in Thailand, and, if Thai intelligence sources are to be believed, played a leading role in organizational work from his position as principal of Thamm Wittaya school in Yala - the forging ground of a generation of BRN-affiliated religious teachers, many trained in Indonesia. While he is now in either
Malaysia or Indonesia, it is likely that there are other BRN leaders in their 50's and 60's operating in Thailand and far from retired.
Misconstrued dynamics
A related misconception complicating analysis of the conflict has been the idea that the insurgency operates as a loose agglomeration of largely independent local cells. Established facts belie this interpretation of the insurgency. The constant movement of weapons and personnel between districts and provinces, regular coordinated operations and a well-developed cross-border logistical support network all reflect a capacity for region wide communication and strategic-level command and control.
At the same time, as in many other insurgencies, there are undoubtedly strains between fighters who are geographically scattered and constantly liable to betrayal, arrest or death and political cadres who work from air-conditioned comfort in either Malaysia or Thailand. Given this reality imposed by geography and function, a political leadership that has prided itself on its ideological intransigence cannot afford a perception at the grass roots that a sell-out oiled by Thaksin money and government blandishments is underway.
This has become all the more important given that the original agreement signed by Hasan and Paradorn on February 28 stipulated that talks would take place within the framework of the Thai constitution. Insisted on by Bangkok but anathema to the BRN mainstream, the clause raised immediate rank-and-file fears of a sell-out.
As a result, talks have now on several occasions been preceded by YouTube announcements aimed at setting out hard-line demands and establishing a measure of transparency. Demands for oversight by international non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) appear also to have been part of efforts to assure ground-level operatives that transparency is - or least should be - the order of the day.
Calls made on YouTube have also been used to step back from more conciliatory positions. At the most recent round of talks on June 13, Hasan agreed to explore the possibility of a reduction of violence over Ramadan. Urged by the government, the agreement was soon translated in the local media as a BRN "promise" to reduce or even suspend violence over the Muslim fasting period. Days later, Hasan was back on YouTube laying down notably hard-line conditions for a reduction in violence.
The public nature of the talks and the media scrum around them has also imposed pressures towards equally maximalist government demands. Now constantly in the media spotlight, Paradorn and his colleagues cannot afford to appear indifferent to the demands of the region's long-suffering civilians. Indeed, they have attempted none too subtly to use them as leverage on BRN with calls for a clear reduction in insurgent violence, ideally everywhere in the restive region and at once.
Such demands, however, cut directly to the hard truth that violence is both BRN's stock-in-trade and its trump card. Without violence, it would not today be sharing a table with the cream of Thailand's security establishment and the region's Patani-Malay identity would have been long buried in the preferred official catch-all of "Thai Muslim". As one insurgent political officer put it recently to this writer: "Believe me: As soon as we reduce the bombing, the government will be less willing to compromise."
No confidence
The main casualty of the current high-profile process and the insistent maximalism that it has encouraged on both sides has been the one mechanism that conflict resolution around the world has proven as the best approach at an early stage: the confidence building measure (CBM). Usually a small, low-key step followed by a series of further steps, the CBM is not necessarily intended to reduce, let alone end, a conflict. Rather it aims to foster mutual trust after years or decades of hostility and should be basic to any dialogue aimed at graduating into substantive negotiations.
The apparent failure to implement any meaningful CBMs speaks to faults on all sides of the process. For BRN, which does not hold any prisoners it could release, a CBM necessarily requires calibrating - as distinct from switching off - violence. In any rural insurgency, this is difficult to organize given the nature of insurgent lines of command-and-control, which are far more fluid than those of a regular army.
On the Thai side, CBMs demand political courage, as well as coordination between civil and military agencies. Bangkok's power establishment is not famous for either. Indeed, the recent squabble as to who should head the NSC followed by the public tirades of outgoing deputy prime minister for security affairs Chalerm Yubamrung against the Southern Border Provinces Administration Center chief Thawee Sodsong only underscored the painfully personalized and often fractious nature of decision-making on the government's side.
The evident absence of a mediator may also be a factor behind the lack of CBMs. An impartial third party enjoying the trust of both sides who can pro-actively suggest initiatives for the belligerents to consider, a mediator is very different from a facilitator. This is particularly so when the facilitator is Malaysia, a decidedly interested party which neither BRN nor Thailand fully trusts.
In talks held between 2005-2011 involving Thailand's NSC and army on one hand and BRN and Patani United Liberation Organization (PULO) representatives on the other, that role was played a European NGO, the Humanitarian Dialogue Centre. The low-key HDC-brokered process fell victim to Thaksin's slam-dunk approach to conflict resolution but the need for an impartial mediator remains obvious.
What might CBMs entail? One possibility tried with a degree of success in June-July 2010 is the limited cease-fire: a mutually agreed but undeclared cessation of offensive operations confined to a specific area - probably not less than a block of three or four districts - and for a limited period of time, perhaps one or two months. On the insurgent side, a deal would cover unit-level operations such as bombings, ambushes and assaults, but leave out the murky area of targeted killings, where a range of actors are involved. For its part, security forces would suspend targeted raids and sweeps, currently the cutting edge of counter-insurgency operations.
There are also steps where Bangkok, which has more to lose from a collapse of the talks and more options at its disposal, could take the initiative, including:
Quietly releasing one or more of the so-called "PULO Four" - jailed leaders of the insurgent Patani United Liberation Organization handed over to Thailand by Malaysian authorities in 1998 and now well beyond any operational relevance. The release of one or more of the group was repeatedly raised by the insurgent side as a desirable CBM in the earlier dialogue meetings.
A reduction of the number of districts subject to the controversial Emergency Decree. This legislation has failed to reduce the violence and could always be re-imposed in the event of an abrupt deterioration in security in areas where it has been lifted. Despite much discussion, the Decree still applies to all but five of 37 insurgency-affected districts.
Introducing zoning for the sale of alcohol and "entertainment" outlets such as bars and karaoke dens in a region where such enterprises are a continual affront to conservative Muslim sensibilities.
With no meaningful CBMs on the horizon, prospects for the coming weeks are bleak. Wholly unrealistic appeals for a violence-free Ramadan from the Thai side and BRN demands for a virtual return-to-barracks of all security forces deployed in the region appear to have set the stage for failure.
That situation was further compounded by confusion over whatever agreement may or may not have been reached on the eve of Ramadan, when Lt Gen Paradorn reportedly proposed a "rearrangement of troops" aimed at lowering the salience of army operations while pushing police and territorial defense volunteers onto the front line. The abrupt cancellation of a Kuala Lumpur press conference called on July 9, the day before the beginning of Ramadan, appeared to point to Malaysia's perennial difficulties in asserting authority over the separatist movement.
If, as seems likely, the fasting month brings with it violence as usual, the pressure will be on Bangkok to abandon the talks. Acquiescing to that pressure, however, would mark a huge setback and short of a particularly horrific attack during the month it is reasonable to assume dialogue will resume after Ramadan.
It would then make sense for both sides, who should now have a much clearer idea of each others' objectives and constraints, to reset the process. With or without a mediator, this could include a shift to low-key working groups discussing potentially fruitful CBMs while cutting back on plenary sessions and the media carnivals that surround them.
There remains a daunting gulf between BRN visions of independence and fond hopes in Bangkok that a settlement can be reached without real reform of the centralized way the kingdom is governed. Bridging that gulf will likely take years with a probability of intensified rather than reduced fighting. Even against this backdrop, the past four months have shown that a conversation aimed at exploring middle ground is possible. The obstacle is a high-profile process that encourages grand-standing and inflated expectations of peace tomorrow.
Anthony Davis is a Bangkok-based security analyst for IHS-Jane's.
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