Nine killed in wave of shootings in Yala, Pattani, Narathiwat
Officers cover the body of Theerapat Plifahchai, of Yala’s Bannang Sata district electricity authority, who was shot dead by two suspected Muslim insurgents yesterday. Eight other people were also shot dead yesterday in a string of ugly attacks.
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The deep South has been rocked by a series of killings attributed to Islamic separatists.
Six people were shot dead in four separate attacks in Yala.
In neighbouring Narathiwat a suspected Muslim insurgent shot and killed a married couple, while a local official was killed in Pattani, bringing the day's death toll to nine.The wave of killings began at 7am in Yala's Bannang Sata district when rubber tapper Amnuay Maneebutr was found shot dead on a roadside. Her injured husband Suan Maneebutr, 47, was taken to hospital with gunshot wounds but later died. Police said two gunmen riding a motorbike opened fire at the couple with a pistol. The two had been aboard a motorcycle on their way home from work. At 8.15am in the same district Provincial Electricity Authority worker Theerapat Plifahchai was shot dead by two gunmen while parking a pickup outside his office. Police suspect the same killers. Then at 9.10am Apichat Sae-wong was shot dead in front of a Bannang Sata public health office. Later in the afternoon, village headman Hasun Yamalae and colleague Euramae Lehmoh, 39, were shot dead while returning on a motorcycle from shopping in Raman district. Elsewhere in the region, Pattani's Tambon Wat deputy chairman Thanong Choomanee, 55, was killed by two gunmen while riding to work. His attackers used AK-47 assault rifles. In Narathiwat's Rusoh district, Sopon Loysuwan, 42, and his wife Wilai Loysuwan, 41, were shot dead by two gunmen as they rode home from work. As many as 1,700 people have been killed in more than 33 months of violence.
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