Thai southern separatist group denies involvement in Bangkok bombings

Thailand's southern separatist group Pattani United Liberation Organization (PULO) criticized ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra for his blaming the New Year's Eve bombings in Bangkok on the southern insurgent movement, Thai news network The Nation reported Friday.

PUlO's Foreign Affairs Chief Kasturi Mahkota, in a statement issued on Wednesday, criticized Thaksin, "who is now out of power, with no sense of guilt and from afar", for blaming the bombings on the southern separatist movement, a report on the website of the English-language newspaper The Nation said.

On Monday, the post-coup government blamed "groups who have lost political power" for the deadly series bombings in Bangkok and its suburb on Sunday night or the New Year's Eve, which killed three persons and injured some 40 others, largely interpreted as referring to Thaksin and his allies.

Thaksin quickly denied the allegation in a statement issued from his overseas exile, and said he believed southern insurgents, who have staged daily violent attacks in Thailand's southernmost provinces, were behind the bombings.

The PULO denied the accusation by calling on anyone who attempted to link the bombings to the group to "stop making myth after myth and face reality instead," Kasturi reportedly said.

He said that the PULO would maintain primarily fighting for Malay Muslim rights and ethnicity, against Thai existence within the scope of former Malay Kingdom of Patani, presently known as the five predominantly Malay-Muslim southern provinces Pattani, Yala, Narathiwat, Songkhla and Satun.

Source: Xinhua