Bomb blast near mosque wounds 23 in restive southern Thailand; teen girl in critical condition

23 hurt by bomb near mosque in southern Thailand

PATTANI, Thailand — A drive-by bombing near a mosque wounded 23 people in Thailand’s turbulent south in what police said Wednesday was an attack by Muslim insurgents.

Witnesses saw two men on a motorcycle throw an improvised explosive device at a government pickup truck in Yala town Tuesday evening, but the bomb missed the vehicle and landed just across the street from the mosque, Police Superintendent Col. Piyawat Chalermsri said.

Most of those hurt were Muslims. Two victims were in intensive care, including a 14-year-old girl in critical condition.

Thailand’s southernmost provinces, the only ones with Muslim majorities in the predominantly Buddhist country, have been gripped for the past six years by a separatist insurgency that has claimed more than 4,000 lives.

Southern Muslims have long complained of being treated as second-class citizens, and the government has put more effort into suppressing the insurgency than dealing with the root causes of their disaffection.

Piyawat said he believed Islamist insurgents targeting the government were behind Tuesday’s bombing. Surveillance video broadcast on Thai TV stations showed an explosion seconds after an army truck drove by a teahouse.

However, one analyst was skeptical about the government claim because no previous attacks had been carried out in that area of Yala, which is a wholly Muslim sector filled with people going to the mosque.

Buddhist vigilantes in the region have also been known to carry out attacks seeking revenge against Muslims.

“This smells very fishy,” said Don Pathan, a journalist and co-author of a recent book on the southern insurgency. “It doesn’t make sense that this is an insurgent-related attack.”