String of 29 bombings rocks Thailand

BANGKOK, Thailand -- A coordinated string of at least 29 bomb blasts in Thailand's largely Muslim south may have been timed for the start of Lunar New Year festivities and intended to frighten ethnic Chinese traders as part of a campaign to damage the economy, a military spokesman said this week.

The bombs, which killed at least eight people and wounded about 50 people, were the latest eruption of large-scale violence in an insurgency that has seen nearly daily attacks over the past three years.

Zachary Abuza, an American specialist on the southern conflict, said in a report last month that 1,900 people had been killed since a long-running insurgency escalated in January 2004.

The nearly simultaneous explosions Sunday recalled similar coordinated violence in August, when at least 100 attacks occurred, and in June, when 46 bombs exploded at police, military, and business targets.

Officials pointed to the shooting deaths of three Thais of Chinese descent Sunday as evidence that some of the violence was timed to the start of the Lunar New Year holiday.

"The insurgents wanted to scare away Chinese businessmen from the region," said an army spokesman, Colonel Acra Tiprote. "The separatist movement aimed to damage the atmosphere of the Chinese New Year celebration, through which they can also damage the economy of the country."

If so, this timing fit an emerging pattern of attacks on Buddhist targets, including temples and shrines as well as monks making their daily rounds with begging bowls.

There have been no claims of responsibility for the violence, but most of the attacks are believed to have been carried out by loosely coordinated insurgent groups in southern Thailand, some of which seek a separate state.

Thai Muslims, including about 1.8 million people who live in the country's three southernmost provinces, are a tiny portion of the country's population of 65 million, most of whom are Buddhist.

A separatist insurgency in the region, a former independent sultanate, has ebbed and flowed over the years. It feeds on discontent over government mistreatment and economic neglect. Many analysts say its escalation in early 2004 was partly a response to strong-fisted policies instituted by the government of Thaksin Shinawatra, who was ousted in a coup in September.

The new military-backed government has attempted to reverse that policy with conciliatory gestures, but these have been met by a renewed surge of violence.

The attacks Sunday seemed intended to cause death and injury as well as disrupt government services. Hotels, karaoke parlors, and commercial areas were bombed, some of them in areas that serve tourists from Singapore and Malaysia. "These incidents clearly show that the militants are targeting more populated areas," said Tiprote.

Other explosions at two electricity transmitters caused temporary blackouts in several areas, the police said.