Official, policeman victims in Thai south

Official, policeman victims in Thai south

THAILAND: One state official has been killed and a policeman
wounded in separate gun attacks in Thailand's Muslim-majority
south where more than 325 people have died in separatist violence
this year, police said on Sunday.

Pattani provincial official Arthit Damkliang, 41, died on the
way to hospital on late Saturday after being gunned down outside
his house by two men on a motorcycle, said police.

Arthit was the first official to be killed by gunmen since the
start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadhan on Oct. 15.

Earlier that day Police Sergeant Avirut Samanung, 50, was shot
six times by gunmen on a motorcycle in front of hundreds of
people at a market in Narathiwat province, a police spokesman
said. He remains in a critical condition.

A separatist insurgency in the Muslim-majority south has
continued sporadically for decades and sparked into life again in
January with a raid on an army depot. -- AFP