Schools close in province hit by Muslim insurgency

Schools close in province hit by Muslim insurgency

Agencies, Bangkok

More than 300 schools in a southern Thailand province hit by a
Muslim insurgency closed their doors on Thursday, with fearful
teachers saying they won't return until the government can
provide adequate protection, an education official said.

Following the recent killings of three teachers,
representatives agreed on Wednesday that public schools in three
southern provinces would go on strike, but most in Yala and
Narathiwat provinces remained open on Thursday. The reason was
not immediately known.

"All public schools, of which there are more than 300 in
Pattani province, are closing because the teachers and students
are too scared to go to school," said Chien Sriruang of the
Teachers' Association of Pattani in a telephone interview.

Pairat Wihakarat, who heads the Southern Teachers Association,
said a meeting would be held on Thursday to decide whether to
close schools in the other two provinces.

More than 570 persons have died since Muslim militants early
this year rekindled a decades-old dream of a state separated from
the Buddhist-dominated country.

Many Muslims in the south complain of discrimination and
insensitivity by government officials and especially the police
force, which has become a prime target of the insurgents.

In a related development, thousands of police reinforcements
are being sent to Thailand's south after warnings of a bombing
campaign targeting tourist spots before the first anniversary of
a separatist insurgency, police said on Thursday.

"Two thousand police reinforcements from across the country
will officially start working in the Muslim-majority provinces on
Jan. 1," the southern region's police commissioner, Lt. Gen.
Manoch Kriwong, told AFP.

National police chief Kowit Wattana said the reinforcements
were part of measures to deal with a potential increase in
attacks in the new year to mark the anniversary.

Security officials have said Islamic militants in the south
are planning major attacks in the southern provinces and the
capital Bangkok around Jan. 4, the anniversary of a raid on an
army base that sparked the insurgency which has claimed more than
560 lives.

A security source has told AFP that one reason for planned
attacks in Bangkok was to prevent the government of the mainly
Buddhist kingdom from sending additional forces to the south.

Kowit said the officers would remain in the south for one year
to help provide long-term stability.

Bangkok residents should be on the lookout for suspicious
packages and saboteurs disguised as camera-clicking tourists, the
Thai army says in a new anti-terror handbook.

The seven-page booklet, entitled Joint Thai Cooperation in
Maintaining Public Security, is being handed out amid fears that
the capital may be targeted by militants.

"Entertainment places should be on the lookout for abandoned
motorcycles, check trash bins, and tourists who prefer to stay in
the shadows without ordering a drink," the handbook says.

It says department stores packed with holiday shoppers and
foreign tourists should check vehicles entering parking lots.
Shops selling chemicals should keep records of foreign customers.

The booklet urges people to watch out for saboteurs posing as
tourists snapping photos or videotaping potential targets in the
sprawling city of 10 million people.

"They may study places for sabotage by counting the number of
steps they need to walk, and when confronted, would pretend that
they are lost. They would be interested in finding nooks and
crannies where they can stash explosives.

"Their eyes are constantly surveying areas and they like to
whisper to their companions. They would avoid using credit cards
to complicate any attempts to trace them, and when asked about
their nationality, would look uncomfortable," the handbook says.

Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra on Thursday played down
another warning, this time by his security advisor, that
separatists were planning a string of attacks.

The advisor, Gen. Kitti Rattanachaya, was quoted by local
media as saying southern separatists planned to strike tourist
resorts and open their bases to foreign Islamic extremists.

"This is just speculation from him," Thaksin said.

"I have many intelligence sources and I don't know that,"
Thaksin told reporters, adding: "He is only an advisor so how is
he going to know more than me?"

Thaksin on Saturday said many of the militants were training
and finding sanctuary in Malaysia, sparking a diplomatic row with
that country. The row spread to Indonesia when the premier
accused extremists there of fanning the insurgency by training
and indoctrinating Thai militants.