Maleekee Doloh could count himself lucky for surviving the deadly journey in an army truck from Tak Bai district of Narathiwat to Ingkayuth camp in Nong Chik district of Pattani on that fateful day on October 25, 2004 infamously known as the Tak Bai incident.
Widespread criticism of unfair justice system in the Deep South as perceived in the number of security-related cases being dismissed by the court is misleading, according to Mr Sophon Tipbamrung, Narathiwat provincial prosecutor.
The recent appointment of Mr Kasturi Mahkota as the new president of Pattani United Liberation Organisation (Pulo) has now been challenged by the Pulo’s council of senior leaders.
The governors of two southernmost provinces of Yala and Narathiwat are among 34 high-ranking interior officials reshuffled as endorsed by the cabinet on November 15.
The Pattani United Liberation Organisation (Pulo) has recently announced the appointment of a new leader, Mr Kasturi Mahkota, but the Thai security authorities are indifferent to the new appointment claiming that the decades-old separatist movement has no control of the new breed of Islamic insurgents who have been waging a terror campaign in the deep South.
Most of the Islamic insurgents who were involved in the multiple bomb attacks in Yala townseat on the night of October 25 were newly-recruited RKK members and among them were several students of Yala’s educational institutes, according to Yala governor Krisda Boonrach.
The killing of a family of three Thai Buddhists in Panareh district of Pattani province on October 13 was believed to be part of a terror campaign waged by Islamic insurgents to force the Thai Buddhists out of the deep South and to drive a wedge between them and their Malay Muslim neighbours.
The government of Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra has given a greenlight to the proposal of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission to heal the wounds caused to people in the deep South from actions perpetrated by security forces.
Mrs Chitra Payom and Mrs Maska Jeh-uma are long-time residents of Narathiwat who don’t know each other but, due to uncontrollable circumstances, share one thing in common – that is both have lost their loved ones in the continuing senseless violence in the deep South.
The government has decided to set up a new organization to deal with unrest problem and development in the five southern provinces of Yala, Pattani, Narathiwat, Songkhla and Satun provinces.