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A long series of conflicts has resulted in over 1200 deaths in the past decade, with more than 1000 occurring since an escalation of violence in January of 2004. In July of 2005 the Prime Minister of Thailand, Thaksin Shinawatra, assumed wide-ranging emergency powers to deal with the insurgency. In September 2006, Army Commander Sonthi Boonyaratkalin was granted an extraordinary increase in executive powers to combat the unrest. On 19 September, Sonthi and the Thai military seized power from Thaksin. Despite reconciliatory gestures from the junta, the insurgency has continued.
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Over 80% of the population in Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat continue to adhere to Islam. However, the Pattani Malays have little sense of connection with the Malays of modern Malaysia, and they speak a distinct local version of the language known as Yawi.
There has been a separatist movement in Pattani since at least the 1930s, but under successive Thai military regimes it was firmly suppressed.
Renewed agitation began in the 1990s, led by Malay intellectuals influenced by revolutionary and Islamist ideas from the Middle East.
... It is believed that there is now a co-ordinating body called the Pattani United Liberation Organization (Dewan Pembebasan Pattani or PULO), although little is known about the composition or leadership of the various groups.
A resurgence in violence by Pattani separatist groups began in 2001. Some experts have suggested this occurred under the influence of foreign Islamist groups such as al-Qaeda and Jemaah Islamiyah, though such connections have never been fully substantiated and remain highly contentious. Some reports suggest that a number of Pattani Muslims have received training at al-Qaida centres in Pakistan, though many experts believe, to the contrary, that the Pattani separatism has little or nothing to do with global jihadism.
At first the government blamed the attacks on "bandits," and indeed many outside observers believe that local clan, commercial or criminal rivalries do play some part in the violence in the region.
... Minister Purachai Piemsomboon attributed the attacks on the police to the issue of drug control, as the "police are making serious efforts to make arrests over drugs trafficking."
In 2005, Bangkok Senator Sophon Supapong accused the United States of being the mastermind behind bombings in Hat Yai. His accusation was supported by Perayot Rahimmula, Democrat MP and professor at Prince of Songkhla University.
In 2006, Thai Army chief Sonthi Boonyaratglin suggested that former communist insurgents might be playing a role in the unrest. Governors of the southern provinces showed some skepticism over his suggestion, but investigated the connection.
In the past 5 years Thailand had more high official visits from Washington, probably than any other country on this globe except for Iraq.
...
Whatever discussion those visits subjected, I cannot know.
...
Except for one possible agenda: the high prominent neo-con visists to Bangkok could be for the metamorphosing of a local conflict of cultural autonomy into a branch of Al Queda insurgency.
A rather advanced spin it would take, so they need coaching.
Agence France Presse: Thailand eyes Myanmar’s natural gas reserves
Mon 31 Jul 2006
Filed under: News, Business / Trade
Thailand’s largest energy firm PTT Plc Monday said it has joined the race against China and India in a bid for exclusive rights to military-run Myanmar’s northwestern natural gas reserves.
International Team Completes Gas Hydrate Expedition in the Offshore of India
Released: 11/7/2006
The expedition was conducted by an international team of scientists led by the USGS and the Indian Directorate General of Hydrocarbons. Scientists explored four offshore Indian Ocean basins, including the Kerala-Konkan Basin in the Arabian Sea, the Krishna-Godawari Basin and Mahanadi Basin in the Bay of Bengal, and the Andaman Islands, to conduct scientific drilling, well logging, coring, and shipboard scientific analyses of recovered samples. Their goal was to further define the energy resource and to gain insight into the potential availability of gas hydrates for use as a viable energy product.
The science team was led by USGS scientist Dr. Timothy Collett, who believes, "this was a great opportunity to work with some of the world's best researchers. It was one of our most ambitious, complex, and comprehensive gas hydrates field ventures yet." The expedition's scientific highlights to date are:
Discovery of significant gas hydrate accumulations with the recovery of 2,850 meters of core.
Sampling and defining one of the world's richest marine gas hydrate accumulations in the Krishna-Godhavari Basin.
Discovery of one of the thickest and deepest gas hydrate occurrences in the Andaman Sea, revealing 600 meter deep gas-hydrate-bearing volcanic ash layers.
Establishment of a gas hydrate-bearing system in the Mahanadi Basin of the Bay of Bengal. Demonstration of advanced logging-while-drilling operations.
Further development of techniques for InfraRed core imaging and pressure coring data processing.
Wiki
In November 2006, Prime Minister Surayud Chulanont revealed that the insurgency was being finance by restaurants and stalls selling Tom Yam Kung in Malaysia. Surayud claimed that the Tom Yam Kung network collected money from local businessmen through blackmail and demands for protection fees and channelled the sum to the separatists. Malaysian Deputy Security Minister Fu Ah Kiow described the revelation as "absolutely baseless," and "very imaginative."
Originally posted by NumberCruncher
I was under the impression that Malays are some of the most racist people on the planet, take for example non-Malays in Malaysia, ritually discriminated against and massively under representated as a percentage of the population, it last like 30 years Chinese Malaysian have gone from 45pc to 25pc of Population, yet Malaysia lets 3 million Muslim Indonesians immigrate and gives them a higher social rank (bumiputra) than Malaysian born Chinese.
Just see how how it is to move to Malaysia, especially as a non Muslim and you will see that Malays are racists or atleast represented by Muslim Malay racists.
SO it is my opinion that most of the Trouble in Sth Thailand is from Islamofascists that are quite possibly sponsored by Racist Malaysian Government officals.
Originally posted by dagebow
Khunmoon how about getting some facts correct before laying claim to another conspiracy!
The area in Question has been a hot bed for some 80 years, if not longer as locals desire their own independant nation. WWII saw the people of this area side with the allies in the hope of gaining independance at the end whilst Thailand was under Japanese control. It didn't happen of course.
Conflict occured in the late 40's and early 50's before the Thai government gained control and also the Malay emergency ending helped.
Originally posted by XphilesPhan
I have a very simple answer.....MUSLIMS!
Originally posted by madnessinmysoul
Originally posted by XphilesPhan
I have a very simple answer.....MUSLIMS!
that could just be an ignorant answer
the problem is the general political instability that thailand has faced
good example of this, the recent coup
i was talking to my thai neigbors about it the other day, and they were neither shocked or concerned because it has happened so often in their life
Originally posted by rich23
And I also have to say that the people who come here and just spout the same old islamophobe stuff get no respect from me. They bring no facts to the thread, and jump to conclusions that fit their prejudices just to make themselves feel superior. I've also seen the word "racist" bandied about by someone who is completely unconscious of the extent to which they are (in the psychiatric sense) projecting. Tragic. I hope that the investigative and scholarly attitude of the OP prompts some proper debate rather than the primitive knee-jerk reactions of some of the posters thus far.
Originally posted by XphilesPhan
well with at least 70% or more of the current conflicts involving muslims in some fashion, Id have to say it was a pretty intelligent answer.
Originally posted by madnessinmysoul
Originally posted by XphilesPhan
well with at least 70% or more of the current conflicts involving muslims in some fashion, Id have to say it was a pretty intelligent answer.
so, because muslims are involved in conflicts they are the root of conflicts...
no, that isn't intelligent, it's actually illogical
maybe the problem is guns, because 100% of armed conflicts involve guns
I would say, maybe it's semantic misinterpretion, but the foremost issue that axed him was he took corruption to levels even for Thailand unseen. But it is true he was elected on a promise to put an end to corruption.
He had a reputation of strong political control over Thailand, anti-king statements and anti-coruption.
Originally posted by dagebow
Thailands cleaning up is probably one of the best moves its done in awhile - the sex industry brought in crime, drugs and other unwanted vices and removing this like Malaysia also has done should help reduce crime especially in Bangkok.
Originally posted by NumberCruncher
I was under the impression that Malays are some of the most racist people on the planet, take for example non-Malays in Malaysia, ritually discriminated against and massively under representated as a percentage of the population, it last like 30 years Chinese Malaysian have gone from 45pc to 25pc of Population, yet Malaysia lets 3 million Muslim Indonesians immigrate and gives them a higher social rank (bumiputra) than Malaysian born Chinese.
Just see how how it is to move to Malaysia, especially as a non Muslim and you will see that Malays are racists or atleast represented by Muslim Malay racists.
SO it is my opinion that most of the Trouble in Sth Thailand is from Islamofascists that are quite possibly sponsored by Racist Malaysian Government officals.
From Article 160, Clause 2 of the Malaysian Constitution
"Malay" means a person who professes the religion of Islam, habitually speaks the Malay language, conforms to Malay custom and -
* (a) was before Merdeka Day born in the Federation or in Singapore or born of parents one of whom was born in the Federation or in Singapore, or is on that day domiciled in the Federation or in Singapore; or
* (b) is the issue of such a person;
Originally posted by madnessinmysoul
good example of this, the recent coup
i was talking to my thai neigbors about it the other day, and they were neither shocked or concerned because it has happened so often in their life