Associated Press
December 6, 2004
Origami Airdrop Fails to Quell Thai Violence
BANGKOK, Thailand -- A massive airdrop of paper birds intended to
promote peace failed to halt violence in Thailand's restive south,
with a spate of new attacks Monday that targeted soldiers and local
officials.
The bombings, shootings and arson attacks came hours after Prime
Minister Thaksin Shinawatra said Sunday's airdrop of nearly 100
million Japanese-style origami cranes over the predominantly Muslim
region had achieved an "enormous, positive psychological effect"
toward peace.
On Monday morning a bomb was detonated at a rest stop for patrolling
soldiers. Four troops were wounded, one seriously, in Narathiwat
province's Ra-ngae district.
Another bomb exploded nearby hours later, seriously injuring an
assistant district chief as he parked his car.
The official, Pricha Nuannuay, 38, had gone to the area to instruct
security forces to carry out thorough searches for explosive devices,
police said.
A third bomb found later in a garbage bin was defused by police.
More than 540 people have died this year in the southernmost provinces
of Narathiwat, Pattani and Yala -- the only Muslim-majority regions in
Buddhist-dominated Thailand -- in violence blamed on Islamic
separatists.
Encouraged by the government, Thais across the country - Cabinet
ministers, office workers, schoolchildren and even convicts -- folded
more than 130 million paper birds to promote peace in the south.
While meant as a morale-boosting measure for victims of violence,
Sunday's origami airdrop resembled a festive treasure hunt with prizes
offered for some specially marked birds. People who collected large
quantities could trade them in for items ranging from cartons of milk
to bicycles.
Especially coveted was one bird folded and signed by Thaksin, which
offered a scholarship if found by a child or a job for an adult.
Thaksin said Sunday the paper bird airdrop showed residents of the
three southern provinces that they are part of Thai society, and that
their countrymen care for them.
Hours after Thaksin spoke, the owner of a tea shop in Pattani was
slain by gunmen, grenades were thrown at the homes of two policemen in
the same province, and arsonists set fire to a school in Yala and a
teacher's house in Narathiwat.
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