Thai govt urged to change tactics in the south
Sep 6, 05 11:15am
Malaysian Muslim leaders are urging Thailand to drop its hardline stance on the southern provinces where an insurgency is raging, and say they will harbour any refugees from the crisis.Political and religious leaders said that instead of reacting with force, Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra should build trust with the kingdom's Muslim minority which has been shattered by months of violence.
"As a neighbour we hope there could be an amicable solution to resolve the crisis, with Kuala Lumpur playing a role. We do not want the crisis to explode," said Husam Musa, vice-president of Islamic opposition party, PAS.
Husam, who is also a state assemblyman in Kelantan where dozens of Thai Muslims fled last week saying they feared for their lives, said the government's strategy to fight the insurgency needed to be reviewed.
"We hope the Thai government will
not take a hard-line approach," he told AFP, warning that there could be an exodus of frightened Muslims from southern Thailand unless Thailand changes its tactics.
Nik Aziz Nik Mat, spiritual leader of PAS and Kelantan's chief minister, has already been rapped by Thailand for criticising its policies on the south, which include an emergency decree that gives authorities sweeping powers.
Thailand has also been infuriated by the flight last week of 131 Thai Muslims across the border, but Nik Aziz is rallying Malaysians to welcome any more that may arrive. "I appeal to Kelantan residents, if our Muslim brothers and sisters come, please give them food and drink," he told AFP. "They are our neighbours and they are Muslims and we have a common culture and origin with them."
The people of the northern states of Malaysia and the southern
provinces of Thailand indeed share a religion, culture and language. With its mosques and headscarves, the Thai south looks more like Malaysia than the rest of Thailand.
Muslim Thais tend to speak a Malay dialect rather than the Thai language, and complain they feel like second-class citizens in their own country - a sentiment that has helped fuel a decades-old separatist movement.
Lift the emergency decree
Analysts and authorities say the attackers are a mix of Islamic separatists, organised criminals and drug dealers.
The trouble in the south flared early last year, and since then nearly 900 people including villagers, security forces, Buddhist monks and Muslim religious teachers have been shot, blown up and hacked to death in attacks that have triggered an ever-increasing level of response from the government.
Malaysian preacher Abdul Halim Ramli called on Thaksin to break the cycle of violence by withdrawing the suffocating military presence in the region and lift the emergency decree enacted last month.
"This is one of the factors that is fuelling Muslim anger. As long as there are injustices and killings of Muslim clerics, I do not think peace is in sight," he said.
He also called on Muslims to resolve the crisis at the negotiating table and not by resorting to
force. "The Thai government is backed by a big and strong military. Accept your fate," he said.
Nik Mahmood, the chief of Pecah village in Tanah Merah district where the displaced Thais are being detained, also said Thaksin should send the troops back to their barracks.
"The government must first calm the tense situation to create a conducive environment for talks," he said.
The arrival of the 131 Thai Muslims, who are being given temporary shelter while their status and reasons for leaving are probed, has become a major irritant to relations between the neighbours.
Malaysian Foreign Minister Syed Hamid Albar's comment that Thailand must win the support of Muslims in the south to prevent any more spillovers was met with a frosty response in Bangkok.
On Monday he said Malaysia would not interfere in Thailand's internal affairs, but also
called on it to be "sensitive to their neighbours and their neighbours' fears".
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