US says Thai insurgency 'very worrisome'

0 Comments | AFP, July, 2008

WASHINGTON (AFP) — The United States said Tuesday that a Muslim insurgency in southern Thailand was "very worrisome" but did not anticipate any role in helping to resolve the turmoil.

More than 3,300 people have been killed since separatist unrest broke out in January 2004, and militants' tactics have turned increasingly gruesome, with a US rights group reporting that beheadings, live burnings and torture have become a common feature.

"The insurgency in southern Thailand is very worrisome, I know it is very worrisome to the Thai authorities," Scot Marciel, the US envoy to the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), told a forum of the Washington-based Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.

He said the new government of Thai Prime Minister...