Thailand claims to have detained GAM rebels

Thailand claims to have detained GAM rebels

Five heavily armed men arrested by Thai officials last month were members of a rebel group fighting for independence in the Indonesian province of Aceh, a senior Thai official said on Monday.

The five Indonesians, caught with two M-16 rifles, three AK- 47s and 1,200 rounds of ammunition, were members of the Free Aceh Movement (GAM), whose three-decade rebellion in Indonesia's gas- rich Aceh province has killed at least 12,000 people.

"Those five Indonesians who were arrested with weapons are members of the Free Aceh Movement and they are now in the custody of police in Pattani," Thai Defense Minister Thammarak Isarangura told a Senate debate.

Thammarak gave no other details, but Police Maj. Gen. Paitoon Pattanasopon told Reuters from the southern province of Pattani the five would be charged with illegal arms possession, which could bring them up to 10 years in jail.

"During the interrogation, they said they were Acehnese, not Indonesians," Paitoon said.

The Thai navy boarded a Thai fishing boat in April after it signaled it was in distress and arrested the five men, all in their 20s, off the southern town of Satun in the Andaman Sea.

They were initially held in suspicion of piracy but the boat's captain said they were not intending to rob it.

An Indonesian embassy official in Bangkok said he could not confirm the five were GAM members but said they had refused consular assistance.

"I can't say 100 percent that they are GAM members, but I have never heard of an Indonesian citizen who denies help from the embassy," the official told Reuters.

A fourth round of peace talks between the rebels and the Indonesian government were expected to end on Monday in Helsinki. The talks were revived after a huge earthquake and tsunami on Dec. 26 killed up to 160,000 people in Aceh. -- Reuters