Bangkok battles to bridge trust gap with insurgency’s controlle

Don Pathan
Special to The Nation

YALA, Thailand

Barisan Revolusi Nasional remains wary of peace talks after years of Thai military-backed ‘trickery’

Talk of another Bt50 million grant to bridge the trust gap between local civil society organisations (CSOs) in the far South and state agencies, namely the Army, has been in the air for some time. But if it’s anything like the first grant delivered earlier this year, the money will not be worth the hassle.

The fund created bitter division among the local CSOs, some of whom now see the grant aid as a Trojan horse, pitting friends against friends in arguments over the very idea of receiving money from the military, especially when strings are attached.

The Army said driving a wedge among CSOs was not its intention and suggested more money was on its way. They insisted it was meant to help boost the capacity of local CSOs and instil progressive ideas among groups like the Federation of Patani Students and Youth (PerMAS) and the Civil Society Assembly for Peace (Kor Por Sor). As expected, these organisations rejected the offer.

Promoting rules of engagement 

There is also talk of asking international non-government organisations (INGOs) to do more work with local CSOs and, if possible, with the Barisan Revolusi Nasional (BRN), the separatist group that controls virtually all of the combatants in the decades-old insurgency.

The idea is to promote concepts such as International Humanitarian Law, and the Geneva Convention. Privately, Thai officials hope these ideas will cause a split between the more progressive faction and the hardliners in the BRN.

Yet it’s not entirely clear where the Army is going with the idea of strengthening the capacity of civil society. General Udomchai Thamsarorat, the new chief negotiator for the peace initiative, said he would like to see southern CSOs come together to mediate relations between the government and the BRN. That could be a forlorn hope, given that local CSOs are split over issues like peace talks.

BRN sources said getting the CSOs to play a mediation role is a pipe dream and, worse, a cynical strategy aimed at pitting civil society against the BRN movement. BRN operatives argue that, in many ways, they are closer to the people than the CSOs can ever be. They claim to have cells in just about every tambon, with eyes and ears constantly testing the mood of their constituency.

Combatants say they always listen to the concerns of villagers, especially over how the war is fought. The arson attacks on Buddhist temples and schools and the mutilating of Thai soldiers’ bodies that were frequent in 2006 have since given way to “legitimate” attacks on security apparatus, while restraint is being shown when “soft” targets are occasionally chosen.

The brutality in 2006 came to a halt after local residents, including religious leaders, protested it violated Islamic principles. The conflict with the Thais is still very much ethno-nationalist in nature, but the voices of local Muslims at the grassroots had to be respected, BRN operatives conceded.

By contrast, locals remain somewhat indifferent on the subject of negotiations with the state, said BRN operatives. For what it’s worth, chief Thai negotiator Udomchai has been saying all the right things, telling the Malaysian government and the CSOs that he does not believe in forcing BRN leaders to come to the table. While Thailand’s negotiators would like nothing more than to talk with the BRN ruling council, the Dewan Pimpinan Parti (DPP), they are reluctant to support harsher measures promoted by Malaysia that might force BRN leaders further underground.

If they did go to ground, BRN chiefs would disappear from everybody’s radar, making it more difficult to construct a channel of communication with the insurgency’s controllers. Udomchai also ditched plans for a Safety Zone and the ceasefire that came with it, suggesting the scheme was dead.

BRN sources meanwhile said negotiations with the Thais were not on their priority list. The fact that MARA Patani is already at the table doesn’t help. MARA Patani is an umbrella group of long-standing separatist movements that no long control militants in the insurgency zone. BRN sources said they would like to reach a better understanding of international norms and strengthen their capacity before they even begin to consider negotiating with Bangkok.

The movement sees the various peace initiatives over the years as part of a shrewd strategy to trick their leaders into surfacing and then forcing an agreement without addressing the historical grievances of their people. Raising the bar to peace even higher is that more and more BRN operatives now see full independence for the far South as a moral obligation.

Nevertheless, Thai officials are trying hard to establish a channel of communication with the DPP, either through Malaysia or friends and relatives of the leaders.

Artef Sohko, The Patani

“Already, Thai authorities have been leaning on friends and family of known DPP figures, trying to use them as intermediaries,” said Artef Sohko, a political activist from The Patani, a local CSO aimed at promoting rights to self-determination for the people in this region.

Patani Malay activists are now being approached by Bangkok to act as go-betweens. But these individuals said they are concerned they may become targets for violence by “spoilers” in the peace process or those with different agendas.

They point to the shooting death of Pattani Islamic cleric Ustaz Waesumae Suden, in September 2014, and the murder of Yala Imam Abdullateh Todir, in November 2012, as examples of what can happen to civilians who get too involved in the peace initiative.

Sadly, just about every senior Thai figure assigned to the far South, either as a commander or negotiator, has believed they had a trick up their sleeve that would magically break the deadlock. Needless to say, none of their plans has worked, each falling victim to their over-eagerness to get things done on their watch.

They refuse to see the conflict in generational terms, and each and everyone has gone home empty-handed by the end of their mission.

Don Pathan is a Thailand-based freelance security consultant and a founding member of Patani Forum (www.pataniforum.com), a civil society organisation dedicated to critical discussion of the conflict in Thailand’s far South.

Malaysian Broker to Push BRN Rebels toward Southern Thai Peace Talks

Commentary by Don Pathan
BenarNews

Yala, Thailand

National Revolutionary Front (BRN) insurgents in Thailand’s Deep South have been under tremendous pressure lately to join Malaysia-brokered peace talks. But leaders of the rebel group are holding their ground and refusing to do so, even if this could mean grave consequences.

Car bomb at a hotel in Pattani, August 2016. Photo by: DON PATHAN

The newly designated Malaysian facilitator for the negotiations, Abdul Rahim Noor, informed the Thai side during a recent visit to Thailand that he would give BRN leaders an ultimatum – join the talks or leave Malaysia, according to a senior Thai security official who spoke on condition of anonymity.

The feeling among the Malaysian leadership is that BRN can no longer take Kuala Lumpur for granted, the Thai official said.

The BRN is the southern border region’s largest and most heavily armed separatist organization. Its top leaders are believed to be hiding out in next-door Malaysia.

Hardliners within Thai security circles, on the other hand, said Abdul Rahim’s strategy should be given a chance, but others viewed the ultimatum as counterproductive. Ideally, as the latter group sees it, BRN leaders should come to the negotiating table willingly.

While Thailand’s negotiating team would like nothing more than to talk with leaders in BRN’s ruling council, they will not support any harsh measure that could force the leadership to go underground.

However, according to a senior Thai military officer who is familiar with both Abdul Rahim and Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad, there is a real possibility both men “will employ some stern measures to get what they want.”

It is not clear where the BRN operatives would go if ordered to get out of Malaysia. Some think they might go to Indonesia to join a key member of the organization’s youth wing, Abdulkarim Khalid, the only BRN figure who speaks publicly.

Another option is to return to their historical homeland, Thailand’s far South, and operate from there.

Either way, they would be off the authorities’ radar screen, thus making it that much harder to construct a channel of communication.

“In some ways, this juncture is the moment of truth for the movement,” said Artef Sohko, a political activist from the Deep South, referring to BRN’s leadership.

“Will they continue to resist the pressure from Malaysia to come to the table or make a concession, on the other hand, remains to be seen,” Artef added.

Sitting out current talks

BRN sources said negotiations with the Thais was not on the list of things for them to consider, especially if it meant joining MARA Patani, an umbrella group made up of a number of long-standing separatist movements that no long control insurgents on the ground.

BRN sources said they would like to obtain a better understanding of international norms and strengthen their capacity before they even begin to think about joining the Thais at the negotiating table.

The movement sees the previous and current peace initiative as a shrewd strategy to trick them to come to the table without taking into consideration their concerns and the historical grievances of Patani Malays.

Complicating matters for any peace initiative is the fact that more and more BRN operatives and combatants see independence from the Thai state as a moral obligation.

Nevertheless, Thai officials are trying to reach out to BRN’s ruling council.

Policymakers in Bangkok expressed the sentiment that the current line of communication through Malaysia’s facilitation was not adequate and the Thai government has been struggling to establish a new one that leads to the BRN leaders.

The Thai government has approached some Patani Malay activists to act as go-betweens. But these people said they worried about being killed by spoilers or others with a different agenda.

The shooting death of an Islamic cleric, Ustaz Waesumae Suden, in Pattani province in September 2014, and the murder of Imam Abdullateh Todir in Yala province in November 2012, are often cited as examples of what can happen to people who get too involved with Deep South peace initiatives.

For the past three years up until the appointment of Abdul Rahim, Ahmed Zamzamin Hashim was the one who has acted as the Malaysian go-between for Thailand and the BRN leaders – the ones who refused to come aboard with MARA Patani.

The Thai side felt that Zamzamin had not been very forthcoming and oftentimes misled them into getting their hopes up.

For example, the Thais were led to believe that a meeting between Thailand’s then-chief negotiator, Gen. Aksara Kerdpol, and a key BRN figure in the ruling council, Doonloh Wae-mano (alias Abdullah Wan Mat Noor), was in the pipeline.

Zamzamin also told Bangkok that BRN leaders would respect and observe the Safety Zone, a much talked about pilot project that was supposed to be the legacy of the current crop of the junta, the National Council for Peace and Order (NCPO).

BRN sources insisted that their leaders had never agreed to such commitments, and suggested that messages from Zamzamin to Bangkok may have been lost in translation.

Man with a plan

Retired Army Gen. Udomchai Thammasarorat, who replaced Aksara as the chief Thai negotiator, has ditched the Safety Zone initiative along with a ceasefire component that came with it. He sees these attempts as a lost cause and leftover baggage from the Zamzamin-Aksara era.

The new chief negotiator has a plan.

This time around, he is looking to pressure the BRN by using local civil society organizations (CSOs). He wants all the Thai CSOs working in the far South to unite under one platform to function as the mediator between the state and the BRN rebels.

It’s a long shot, given that the local CSOs don’t always see eye-to-eye over peace initiatives.

Indeed, just about every senior Thai figure who has come to the Deep South, either as a commander or negotiator, believes he has something better than his predecessor.

None of their plans ever worked because they didn’t want to see the conflict in generational terms. Instead, their aim has been to achieve peace or a major breakthrough as if they were planning some sort of physical landmark or construction project.

The idea of getting the CSOs to play a mediation role is a pipedream, BRN sources said. It’s a wicked strategy to pit the local people – that is to say, the CSOs – against the BRN movement.

But according to BRN combatants, in some ways, they are even closer to the people than the CSOs. In fact, the rebels’ network is much broader than the CSOs could ever be, given that they have cells in just about every district in the Deep South.

Don Pathan is a Thailand-based security and development consultant for international organizations. The opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and not of BenarNews.

https://www.benarnews.org/english/commentaries/far-south-view/Don-Pathan-12062018132001.html

In the South, four more WASTED YEARS

The Nation (Editorial)

The military has always set the pace in the border provinces, so it’s no surprise that peace remains elusive under a military govt

The junta is mulling the legacy it will leave behind regarding its four years of control over the troubled southern border provinces.

The generals might not be going anywhere depending on the outcome of the 2019 election, but they must be concerned that there’s so little to show for yet another block of time that’s passed with no resolution to the insurrectionist problem.

For the Malay-speaking South, the junta’s turn in power has been just more of the same as, and in fact oddly reminiscent of, the days when Yingluck Shinawatra, whom the generals ousted, fumbled though attempts at peace initiatives.

Both administrations were cultivating false hope when they knowingly talked to the wrong people to try and persuade the Barisan Revolusi Nasional (BRN), which has command over the armed militants, to participate in talks about ending the conflict.

We now know that the BRN cannot simply be dismissed as stubborn. It has indeed been smart enough to recognise that the Thai authorities’ sole intent was to draw its leaders out in the open and commit them to a process, while their concerns and grievances would continue being ignored.

Many would consider the group wise to remain underground, ready to fight on. The Thai state has not only refused to address the historical grievances of the Malays of Patani, it has failed to indicate any concessions it might be willing to make in the interest of peace.

It was only seven months after the May 2014 coup that the junta announced it would continue efforts made by the Yingluck government to revive the peace process. It said any discussions would have to include all longstanding Patani separatist groups under one representative umbrella – and the umbrella turned out to be MARA Patani. BRN, declining to participate, could be  forgiven for taking offence if the Thais regarded all Patani groups as fundamentally the same.

It reflects a deep-seated prejudice towards the Malays.  Before MARA Patani was formed, its future members were rubbing shoulders with foreign NGOs, the King Prachadhipok Institute and Malaysian special branch police, the aim being to enhance their legitimacy and international standing. T

oday they have nothing to show for such outreach because the people of Patani do not regard them as  legitimate. Without the BRN, the peace dialogue with MARA Patani was doomed to fail. Even Thailand’s new chief negotiator, General Udomchai Thamsarorat, is now suggesting a change in course and has asked to meet BRN leaders separately.

He went as far as ditching the “safety zone” pilot project launched earlier this year, along with its requisite ceasefire, saying he wanted to start again with a clean slate. If this seems sensible and perhaps cause for optimism, beware that, to observers who monitor the conflict closely, Udomchai sounds like a  broken record. Every general in charge before him has arrived on the scene with a fresh trick up his sleeve, and they all went home empty-handed. 

The state and the military have always ensured there were wedges dividing civil society organisations, pitting one against another with offers of funding and laughable “information operations”.

In fact, Udomchai would be well advised to halt such operations, which aren’t so much counter-intelligence as they are counterproductive, pushing aside people and groups that might be helpful. But perhaps that’s to be left to another government.

Malaysia, foreign stakeholders, being ‘played’ by deep South peace process: BRN

Don Pathan
Special to The Nation

International best practices are being ignored as stakeholders in the so-called peace process for Thailand’s Muslim-majority far South seek a quick fix instead of addressing the historical root causes of a conflict that has claimed nearly 7,000 lives since January 2004.

Members of Barisan Revolusi Nasional (BRN), which controls virtually all of the militant rebels, say the current peace initiative between Thailand and MARA Patani is a tactic designed to bypass their demands and also the underlying causes of the dispute between the Thai state and the Malays of Patani. BRN members say they are not interested in joining MARA Patani at the negotiating table and suggest that Malaysia, or any other interested parties, review the mandate of talks or risk compromising their future role. “These so-called peace practitioners, domestic and foreign, could be going along with this shrewd strategy of Thailand without realising that they are being played,” one BRN operative said.

They also expressed concern that pressure from Malaysia to get BRN leaders to the table – something the new facilitator, former police chief, Abdul Rahim Noor, appeared eager to do – could be counterproductive for peace efforts in the long run. The BRN operatives remain convinced their leaders will not compromise their long-term strategy with any hasty moves towards negotiations. 

Asked about BRN information officer Ustaz Abdulkarim Khalid telling foreign journalists recently that the movement’s leaders are prepared to negotiate with the Thais if certain demands are met, one operative said, “Even if the Thai government agreed to the terms stated by Khalid, surfacing and coming to the table would still be an extraordinary risk.

“In the eyes of Siamese officials, we are all still bandits and criminals,” he added.

Getting any Bangkok government to grant official recognition and legal immunity to any BRN representatives is still a pipe dream, they said.

Underling the challenges facing Malaysia as the designated facilitator, sources said, is that Rahim Noor is having difficulty even securing a meeting with senior members of the BRN’s ruling council, the Dewan Pimpinan Parti (DPP). 

Moreover, the operatives remained confused about the “safe space” supposedly guaranteed to foster trust on both sides of the peace talks. Is it a vague concept or an actual place, they ask. But if and when a formal peace process takes shape, the operatives said the talks must be mediated by members of the international community, including Malaysia, with experience in conflict resolution.

They expressed concern that Thai officials could pull out an arrest warrant at any moment should negotiations turn against them. When asked about international norms, humanitarian principles and rules of engagement, the BRN men said they were still not sure what to make of them since the concepts were still new to them.

While they don’t reject these “foreign ideas”, instead expressing a desire to learn more about them, the operatives said their conduct was guided by the sentiment of local Muslim residents and Islamic community leaders. Some of these have spoken out against certain forms of insurgent violence, including arson attacks on public schools and Buddhist temples, and the mutilation of government soldiers killed in attacks that took place during the early stage of a wave of insurgency that surfaced in January 2004.

Civil society organisations often cite International Humanitarian Law (IHL) and the Geneva Convention in attempts to curb with worst excesses of violence during conflicts. “We have been told that these principles will enhance our legitimacy. But we are not exactly sure how this is so,” one operative said. “Some [BRN] people think these could be part of a secret plan to tie their hands or restrict their activities through rules of engagement,” he added.

Nevertheless, the debate on these progressive ideas has garnered some attention among various cells on the ground. For example, last December when a cell attacked a bus in Yala’s Than To district, BRN combatants helped the passengers with their luggage off the bus, moving them to safety before blowing up the vehicle. This was their understanding of IHL. 

But when the military responded by rounding up about 50 young men from the district and applied questionable interrogation techniques, a cell in Yala retaliated by setting off a motorbike bomb at a market in Yala that killed three and injured 18. In May 2017, a powerful car bomb went off at the entrance of the Big C Department Store in Pattani.

The debris inflicted minor injuries on scores of people. BRN combatants said they were not seeking to kill civilians, pointing out that they gave prior warnings so the area could be cleared. There are times when insurgents have deliberately attacked “soft” targets, but only as a form of retaliation against Thai security officials deemed to have “crossed a line”. 

January’s motorbike bomb at the Yala market was one such retaliatory attack. Another was the October 2016 bombing of an evening food stall in downtown Pattani that killed one person and injured more than 20. This attack came in response to the rounding up of about 1,000 Patani Malay youth in Bangkok following rumors of a car-bomb plot that police subsequently failed to back with evidence.

Rules of engagement in the form of a negotiated text do not exist between BRN combatants and Thai security forces. As such, how one interprets what constitutes a “red line” or “legitimate killing” has always been subjective. 

Don Pathan is a security and development consultant based in Thailand and a member of the Patani Forum (www.pataniforum.com), a civil society organisation dedicated to critical discussion about the insurgency in Thailand’s far South.

Thailand Installs Controversial Figure in Deep South Peace Talks

Commentary by Don Pathan
Yala, Thailand

Melayu Muslims carry the body of a shooting victim for burial near Pattani, a town in Thailand’s insurgency-stricken Deep South, April 14, 2007. (AP)

Thailand has decided to replace its chief negotiator for southern peace talks with another retired general, former Fourth Army Area commander Udomchai Thammasarorat.

On the surface, it seems Bangkok was reciprocating recent changes in Kuala Lumpur.

Weeks ago, Prime Minister Mahathir Mohammed replaced Ahmad Zamzamin bin Hashim, the designated facilitator for the Malaysia-brokered talks, with Abdul Rahim Mohd Noor. A former national police chief, he spent a great deal of his career back in the 1980s clamping down on a communist insurgency along the Thai border.

But official Thai sources said Bangkok had many reasons to make the change. Leaders from the military government, they said, were not impressed with Gen. Aksara Kerdpol’s performance over the past three years as the chief Thai negotiator, because he was unable to generate meaningful traction for the talks aimed at ending the separatist insurgency in Thailand’s Deep South.

Aksara was seen as having failed to get the National Revolutionary Front (BRN) – the one rebel group that controls virtually all of the combatants in the field – to endorse Thailand’s peace talks with MARA Patani, an umbrella organisation representing various long-standing Patani Malay separatist movements at the negotiating table.

The participants sitting on MARA’s panel were not endorsed by BRN’s ruling council, sources within the rebel group told me.

This week, a MARA spokesman told BenarNews it had expanded to include three new organizations, but would put off all engagement with Thailand until a new democratically elected Thai government was formed. A general election is expected by May next year at the latest.

Besides not having much to show for, the only card Aksara had in his sleeve was the Safety Zone, a pilot project to designate a ceasefire area, which negotiators hoped could become a model of joint good governance between the state and the rebels.

Moreover, the fact that Aksara had engaged in a lengthy spitting contest with the then-Fourth Army commander, Lt. General Piyawat Nakwanich, did not help his or Thailand’s cause. The two had bickered over their turfs and mandates. It got so nasty that Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-o-cha had to step in.

While Thai leaders had many good reasons for removing Gen. Aksara from the picture, Gen. Udomchai has a number of things going for him – at least from the viewpoint of a Thai military mindset.

Notorious past

As a former Fourth Army Area chief, Udomchai is familiar with hunting down and killing insurgents. It didn’t matter to those who nominated him to be the top negotiator that carrying out a peace process is a delicate process, which requires good sense.

Perhaps the most important reason for Udomchai getting the job, according to Thai official sources, is that he also serves as the “advisor” to the Fourth Army Area. In that role, Udomchai is tasked with building and strengthening a constituency in the far south for the pro-military Palang Pracharat Party. The party has vowed to support Prayuth’s bid to return as PM after the next general election.

Being the chief negotiator may not have a direct correlation with strengthening a constituency for an upcoming election. But at least it will be another feather in Udomchai’s cap and a source of legitimacy for him to be in the far South as he hits the ground there.

Besides, no one really expects Udomchai, like other commanders of the Fourth Army Area, to make any meaningful policy changes. Such moves are pretty much decided in Bangkok.

People should also be aware that his past time in the Patani region was full of controversy. When he was a task force unit commander in the region, Udomchai was instrumental in carrying out a controversial initiative, which saw some 400 Patani Malay youths being forced to attend military-run “job-training camps” outside the far South. These were, in effect, “re-education” sessions.

In October 2007, a Thai court ruled that these camps were holding people against their will. The Fourth Army responded by declaring them “persona non-grata” in their home villages in the far south.\

On top of this, local activists still recall the death of Sulaiman Naesa, a young suspected insurgent who was reportedly tortured to death at Ingkhayutthabariharn, a main military base in the region at the time when Udomchai was the regional commander.

Sulaiman’s case and other reports of torture attracted a number of international reporters to the region. But Udomchai held his ground with blanket denials that his soldiers were torturing suspects.  

Another case was an incident in January 2012 when Thai soldiers shot dead four people, including an elderly man and a teenager, and injured five others who were crammed up in a truck heading to a relative’s funeral in Pattani province’s Nong Chik district.

In the final analysis, the change to Thailand’s negotiating team was not done for the sake of peace in the Deep South, but to support the political needs of the current junta in Bangkok.

Don Pathan is a Thailand-based security and development consultant for international organizations. The opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and not of BenarNews.

https://www.benarnews.org/english/commentaries/far-south-view/Don-Pathan-10172018153110.html

New Malaysian Facilitator Enters Fray of Southern Thai Peace Talks

HOME | COMMENTARIES | VIEW FROM THE FAR SOUTH

Commentary by Don Pathan 

Yala, Thailand
2018-10-08

• Share
• Comment
• Email

Former Malaysian police chief Abdul Rahim Noor answers questions about being asked to serve as the new facilitator of Malaysia-brokered peace talks between Thailand’s government and insurgent groups in the Thai Deep South, during an interview in Kuala Lumpur, Aug. 24, 2018.

S. Mahfuz/BenarNews

Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamed has appointed a former police chief, Abdul Rahim Noor, to facilitate peace talks between the Thai Government and MARA Patani, an umbrella body made up of various separatist groups from Thailand’s Malay-speaking Deep South.

The straight talking, no-nonsense Abdul Rahim is well familiar with security challenges along the Thai-Malaysian border. His claim to fame was bringing down the now-defunct Communist Party of Malaya (CPM) through a peace agreement in 1989.

Dr. Mahathir is no stranger either to the separatist conflict in Thailand’s far south. Back in 2005, after he had stepped down from his first stint as PM, Mahathir enlisted the help of former Malaysian police chief Norian Mai and businessman Shazryl Eskay Abdullah to assist him in the so-called Langkawi peace process, a forum that brought top Thai security officials to the island for which the initiative was named.

Representatives from the Thai National Security Council and Armed Forces National Security Center met with aging exiled Patani Malay separatist leaders, who had no control over a new generation of militants on the ground.

But like other initiatives before and after, the Langkawi process did not generate traction and it wasn’t long before it disappeared from the conversation of stakeholders of this conflict.

The appointment of Abdul Rahim as the new facilitator was met with some resistance from inside Malaysia. Lawmaker Nurul Izzah, the daughter of Anwar Ibrahim, reminded the public of the infamous “black eye” given to her father when, as police chief, Abdul Rahim punched him in the face 20 years ago.

Conversations in the Deep South about Abdul Rahim often touched on the Thanam brothers, key separatist leaders from the Patani United Liberation Organization (PULO) who were deported to Thailand in early 1998 under his watch as police chief.

The move left a permanent scar between the Patani Malay separatist community and the government of Malaysia.

While the political context for the insurgency in Thailand’s far south hasn’t changed – as it’s still very much an ethno-nationalist struggle – a new generation of shadowy combatants under the leadership of the Barisan Revolusi Nasional (BRN) rebel group is roaming the region nowadays, hitting the Thai security forces almost at will.

The extent of Abdul Rahim’s grasp of BRN’s motivation and ideology is still not clear. After all, back in the days when he was calling the shots along the border, it was PULO that dominated the theatre of violence. Today, it is BRN.

Thai military intelligence officials say they are not writing PULO off; the group’s network and support base in the region is growing steadily and could pose a problem for Thailand in the future.

But the main task right now, according to Thai officials, is to get the BRN leadership to join MARA Patani at the negotiations table.

Thai officials believe that the aging Abdul Rahim will apply pressure on the BRN leaders to get them to the table and that he and Dr. Mahathir have less than two years to do so before the prime minister’s job is handed to Anwar.

‘Can’t force peace’

How Abdul Rahim’s dealing with the BRN leaders will play out is anybody’s guess.

But senior sources in the BRN said the movement “was not ready to come face to face with the Thais, regardless of who the facilitating the process.”

Some Thai officials said that they understood why the BRN leaders had balked at entering the talks, saying Thailand’s approach was very “illiberal” as it was based on a simple assumption that the talks with MARA Patani would eventually attract the participation of the BRN.

“You can’t really force peace on people,” said one Thai security official who works on the far south. “BRN leaders have to feel confident enough to come to the table and that that they have to believe that they are getting something out of the talks.”

Besides the changes in Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok is also contemplating its own changes.

There is ongoing talk about replacing Gen. Aksara Kerdpol, the head of the Thai military government’s negotiating team in the peace talks. The Thai army is looking for somebody who “can handle” Abdul Rahim.

One name that has been floated is Gen. Akanit Muensawas, a retired army officer who worked on border security in the 1980s, during the same time as Abdul Rahim.

Both men crossed paths during those years when they were tasked with ending the insurgency along the Thai-Malaysian border.

Abdul Rahim eventually brought an end to the CPM struggle while Akanit slowly disappeared from the scene in the far south as Patani Malay rebels put down their arms following a blanket amnesty program.

Some combatants returned to their respective villages. Others were granted asylum in northern European countries, Malaysia and Indonesia.

But a decade later, as Thaksin Shinawatra was about to become Thailand’s prime minister, a new generation of Patani Malay separatists surfaced on the scene, picking up where the previous generation of separatist militants had left off.

Thailand wrongly assumed that the absence of violence meant peace. The narrative about Patani being a historical Malay homeland invaded by the Siamese never went away.

Don Pathan is a Thailand-based security and development consultant for international organizations. The opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and not of BenarNews.

New commander, but still no counter-insurgency strategy

Lt-General Pornsak Poonsawas has an opportunity to steer deep South toward peace – but he must first change Army policy  

Don Pathan
Special to The Nation

Yala, Thailand

The Thai Army has a new chief in the South and it seems he’s bent on charting a different course from his predecessor, the just-retired Lt-General Piyawat Nakwanich. 

Lt-General Pornsak Poonsawas began his new role by paying a visit to the Shaykhul Islam of Thailand, the Chularatchamontri Aziz Pitakkumphol, to introduce himself two days before officially assuming his post as commander of the trouble-plagued Fourth Army Region.

The visit was a largely symbolic gesture of goodwill towards the senior-most Islamic figure in the country. Pornsak discussed his determination to tackle illicit drug use in the region, one of the few problems the Thai state and local residents agree upon.

Like those before him, Pornsak’s core task is to quell separatist violence in the majority Malay-Muslim provinces in Thailand’s far South. In theory, counter-insurgency strategy calls for a combination of military and non-military means to end the violence and identify its root cause.

But Piyawat hasn’t left Pornsak much to work with. If anything, Piyawat’s tough-talking, shoot-from-the-hip style drove a bigger wedge between the Thai state and local Malay Muslims. 

Just weeks before his mandatory retirement, Piyawat dispatched about 1,000 soldiers and police to lockdown two tambons in Pattani’s Nong Chik district in the wake of a September 11 gunfight that left two soldiers dead and four injured.

Permitted under the emergency and martial laws, his “additional measure” amounted to collective punishment of the local residents who he suggested had turned a blind eye to insurgent activities in the area. 

The two tambons were proclaimed a “Controlled Area” and locals were ordered to report to the Army with registration documents for their boats and vehicles as well as the permits for their weapons.

Most were too scared to leave their homes, not even to attend prayers at the village mosque, for fear of being arrested arbitrarily. 

The battle is for hearts and minds

Counter-insurgency strategy takes for granted that local residents are not on the side of the state, but of the non-state actor. This, in the case of Thailand’s far South, is the Barisan Revolusi Nasional (BRN), the longstanding separatist movement that controls virtually all of the insurgent combatants. 

However, Thai military leaders have yet to come to terms with the fact that local Malay Muslims support the insurgents.

So instead of strategising to win hearts and minds, the military prefers strong-arm tactics that penalise local residents for siding with the insurgents. 

According to one military intelligence officer, it goes without saying that both emergency law and martial law permit the arrest of people who harbour armed insurgents. But Piyawat chose to proclaim this point loudly, reminding local residents exactly who has the power in this historically contested region.

State representatives reminding the Patani Malays that they are a defeated people is nothing new.

Piyawat’s callous treatment of locals in Nong Chik gave local political activists, namely the Federation of Patani Students and Youth (PerMAS), an opportunity to hit back at the government.

PerMAS, a student network advocating for the right to self-determination in this region, condemned Piyawat’s security measures on humanitarian grounds and called for an end to the use of the emergency law and martial law.

Thailand’s emergency law permits the detention of suspects for up to 30 days without formal charges or legal representation. It also grants blanket amnesty to officials working in the region, while the burden of proof falls on the victim who must show that the official acted with malice. Former prime minister Anand Panyarachun called these extraordinary measures “a licence to kill”.

In retaliation against PerMAS and the Civil Society Assembly for Peace (Kor Por Sor), Piyawat arranged a protest in front of the Prince of Songkhla University in Pattani to denounce the university for producing “problematic students”.

Protesters also filed a police complaint accusing PerMAS activists of obstructing justice when they dispatched scores of people to Nong Chik district to meet with the local residents.

PerMAS members noted that the protesters had brought along a token presence of Muslims to give their rally a multicultural veneer.

Military personnel don’t take kindly to political activists, who they see as an extension of the BRN. Army officers say the right to self-determination demanded by PerMAS amounts to a call for independence, rather than just more autonomy, for the Malays in Thailand’s far South. Pornsak has an opportunity to change this zero-sum mentality. The Army’s lack of a counter-insurgency strategy worthy of the name is preventing any progress towards peace in the far South.

Don Pathan is a security and development consultant based in Thailand and a member of the Patani Forum (www.pataniforum.com), a civil society organisation dedicated to critical discussion about the insurgency in Thailand’s far South.