Terror threat grows as JI extremists flee to Cambodia, Thailand:

Terror threat grows as JI extremists flee to Cambodia, Thailand: experts

Talek Harris Agence France-Presse Bangkok

The threat of international terrorism is feared to be growing in Thailand and Cambodia as extremists flee security clamp-downs in other Southeast Asian countries, security experts say.

The arrests in Cambodia this week of two Thai Muslims accused of belonging to the Jamaah Islamiyah (JI) regional terror network is the clearest sign yet of an increase in activity, said political scientist Panitan Wattanayagorn.

"It's suspected that security measures that have been taken up in neighboring countries may bring a rise in (terrorist) activities in other countries like Thailand and Cambodia," said Panitan.

JI operatives are believed to be fleeing security operations in Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia, where scores of suspected members of the al-Qaeda-linked group have been arrested since last October's Bali attack, he said.

"I am sure there will be some incidents that they cannot contain," said the one-time advisor to the Thai government who now lectures at Bangkok's Chulalongkorn University.

Panitan said it was impossible to predict if there would be a repeat of large-scale attacks linked with the al-Qaeda terror network, such as the Bali bombings and the deadly blasts in Saudi Arabia and Morocco this month.

But he said Wednesday's Cambodian arrests served as a warning to Thailand that despite its efforts to distance itself from the terrorist threat, it could find itself in the firing line.

The arrests in Cambodia, where officials said they had smashed a terror ring operating from an Islamic school, prompted Thai premier Thaksin Shinawatra to admit the kingdom is harboring "inactive" members of JI.

Until now, Thailand has consistently played down any association with international terrorism in a bid to protect its lucrative tourism industry.

Tony Davis, Southeast Asia correspondent for Jane's Intelligence Review, also said the arrests indicated a stronger JI presence in Thailand than previously thought.

"My working understanding of Jamaah Islamiyah inside of Thailand is that it has always been very low-key, a few individuals fulfilling a support function, but this might indicate otherwise," he said.

"The fact that there are Thais over there (in Cambodia) puts Thailand's position in the whole regional picture in probably a more prominent light."

Panitan said JI operatives in Thailand could be up to anything from coordinating information to identifying sites to attack. "Mostly they're probably gathering information and perhaps trying to identify targets," he said.

"They may be carrying out activities including some kind of terrorist attacks. From what we hear, their intentions are not good."

Jaran Mahuleem, a political science lecturer at Thammasat University in Bangkok, said the arrests were probably not linked to unrest in Muslim-majority southern Thailand, long considered a likely breeding ground for extremists.

But he said that Muslims in the impoverished south, where a decades-old separatist rebellion has lost steam in recent years, were vulnerable to being recruited by JI.

"JI is a new thing which is happening in Malaysia, and Malaysians are very close with the people in southern Thailand," he said. "(Extremist) activity is there, of course. But no information is available about the movement of JI."

Unconfirmed reports citing FBI intelligence have described a meeting of high-level Arab and Southeast Asian militants in southern Thailand, 10 months before the Bali attack.