Islamic Violence against Buddhists

Thai Buddhist beheaded, another shot in Muslim south
Jun 15, 2009

YALA, Thailand, June 15 (Reuters) - Suspected separatists beheaded a rubber tapper and shot dead a school janitor, both Buddhists, in the latest violence in Thailand's Muslim south, police said on Monday.

The attacks took place in Yala and Pattani, two of the three Malay Muslim provinces where 29 people have been killed and more than 50 injured in the past 10 days, among them soldiers, teachers and Buddhist monks.

The body and severed head of the rubber tapper was found in a house next to a plantation in Yala's Than To district. That added to more than 40 beheadings in the region since violence erupted in 2004.

The school janitor was shot dead by unknown gunmen while travelling to work on his motorcycle in Pattani, police said.

Attacks on Buddhists have increased since a shooting last week at a Narathiwat mosque, where unknown gunmen killed 10 Muslims at prayer and wounded 12 more.

Residents blamed security forces for the bloody attack, which the military said was the work of shadowy rebels seeking to cause sectarian rifts.

A labourer from northeastern Thailand was shot dead two days later and a note left at the scene said: "You kill our innocents, so we kill your people."

A Buddhist monk was killed and another critically injured on Friday when they were gunned down as they collected alms in Yala.

A report by Washington-based Nonviolence International released on Monday said the government's decision to arm Buddhist civilians and deregulate gun sales was deepening rifts between Muslims and the region's Buddhist minority.

The study said the policy had "heightened resentment among the Malay Muslim population towards the Thai state and raised the feeling of injustice and discrimination".

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Militants display severed head in Thai south
Mon Jun 15, 5:51 am ET

YALA, Thailand (AFP) – Suspected Muslim militants decapitated a rubber-tapper and displayed his head on a stick outside his house in the latest violence in Thailand's troubled south, police said Monday.

The attack comes amid a recent spike in bloodshed in the restive Muslim-majority region bordering Malaysia, where more than 3,700 people have been killed during a bitter five-year insurgency.

Police said the 53-year-old victim's body was found with the head, hands and lower legs removed at his makeshift house on a rubber plantation in volatile Yala province on Monday morning.

The attackers stuck his head on a stick and put it in front of the building, they said.

In neighbouring Narathiwat province, a suspected insurgent gunman riding a motorcycle shot dead a Muslim man in front of his house, also on Monday, police said.

Meanwhile a bomb hidden inside a motorcycle and triggered by mobile phone exploded in Narathiwat on Sunday evening, injuring ten people who were shopping at a weekend market, they added.

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Female teacher shot dead; two policemen killed in muslim South

YALA, June 16 (TNA) – A female teacher was gunned down Tuesday morning on her way to school in the violence-plagued province of Yala, and two policemen were killed in a bombing outside a police station in Pattani.

A middle-aged female teacher was killed shortly after 8am Tuesday on her way to school in the violence-plagued province of Yala.

Ban Phomeng School in Raman district’s Tambon Kayuborkok halted classes and closed the school following the death of the 117th teacher known to be killed in the southern insurgency, according to the Southern Teachers’ Confederation.

Rekha Issara, 54, died at the scene after being shot in the head by the passenger of a passing motorcycle on the Raman-Phomeng Road, not far from the school.