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Authorities Suspect Muslims Behind Blasts In Thailand
BANGKOK, April 7 (News Agencies) - Two bomb blasts rocked southern Thailand Saturday, leaving one dead and dozens injured in attacks police believe were carried out by a Muslim separatist group.
The first bomb exploded at 2:25 pm (0725 GMT) on a crowded railway station platform in the southern Thai city of Hat Yai, killing a five-year-old boy and injuring nearly 40 people, officials said.
The second bomb was detonated at 7:15 pm (1215 GMT) in a hotel car park in the town of Betong near the Malaysian border. Five people were injured, although none seriously.
Police said they suspected both blasts were the work of the Pattani United Liberation Organization (PULO), a Muslim separatist group which killed 10 people in a 1993 bombing at the Hat Yai station.
"It's likely that it was planted by PULO. Last year they tried to bomb a railway track, but the device did not go off," Special Branch deputy chief, Major General Sawek Wattanakij, told AFP.
Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra lashed out at Thai intelligence organizations for failing to prevent the Hat Yai bombing, despite an apparent warning blast late last week that had put them on high alert.
"I don't understand why, after there were reports that a sabotage attack was likely, that authorities can fail to prevent such an extremely serious incident," he said in comments made before the second blast.
"I don't know yet which group is responsible for this incident, but it is a serious challenge to the power of the government."
The Hat Yai bomb exploded next to a public information kiosk was packed with dozens of people inquiring about the delayed departure of an afternoon train to Bangkok over the holiday weekend.
Hat Yai's main hospital was treating 38 people for injuries sustained in the blast, staff there told AFP, adding that 10 of them were in a serious condition.
Television stations showed grisly footage of wounded babies and adults being treated for extensive shrapnel wounds at the provincial hospital.
Lieutenant-Colonel Pitak Phutphaviro, head of Hat Yai's crime suppression unit, said the powerful device exploded on the station's Platform One, blowing holes in the walls and badly damaging the information booth.
Forensic police were gathering evidence while other officers searched baggage stacked on the platform, but it was still too early to say what kind of device had been used, he said.
Deputy regional police chief Major-General Manoch Kraivong said security forces had been on alert since late last week when a small bomb destroyed a car that had been impounded by police in a town near Hat Yai.
"Police were on alert during this holiday season," he told AFP.
Although no one has claimed responsibility for the attacks, suspicion inevitably fell on the Muslim separatist groups who operate a low-grade insurgency through the southern provinces bordering Malaysia.
Five of Thailand's southern provinces are home to majority Muslim populations. Hat Yai, an important center for commerce and tourism, is the biggest city in Thailand's south.
Thailand is still reeling after the blast that destroyed a Thai Airways jet on the tarmac at Bangkok's domestic airport on March 3rd, just minutes before Thaksin and his son were due to board.
Although authorities initially declared that a bomb was to blame for the explosion and resulting fire that gutted the aircraft, they now admit they are still uncertain about the cause of the near-disaster.
Investigators had speculated that drug traffickers or political rivals may have targeted Thaksin, or that the attack was the result of rivalries plaguing the national carrier and airport authorities.
The premier is to travel to Hat Yai Sunday morning to inspect the damage and meet provincial officials.
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