Nine injured in blasts, one shot dead, in restive Thai south

0 Comments | AFP, November, 2006

YALA, Thailand (AFP) — At least nine people have been injured in eight coordinated blasts at car and motorcycle showrooms in Thailand's insurgency-torn south, police said, while one man was shot dead. The attacks in Yala and Pattani provinces came a day after new premier Surayud Chulanont visited the Muslim-majority region, where separatist violence and other unrest has killed nearly 1,600 people since January 2004.

Suspected separatist insurgents placed bombs in exhibition vehicles at six car showrooms and two motorcycle showrooms in the provincial capital Yala town, and they exploded almost simultaneously at 11:57am (0457 GMT), police said. "They are coordinating the bombs and targeting business," a local police officer told AFP. The first explosion, at an Isuzu showroom,...