Bangkok - Seven Thai policemen and three soldiers have been arrested for allegedly supplying intelligence to the shadowy Islamic insurgents in Thailand's deep south, The Nation newspaper reported Monday. This is believed to be the first time so many members of the security forces have been directly linked to the separatists in what has become an increasingly ugly civil war.
The central authorities have claimed recently to be getting to grips with a bloody conflict that has raged hotly for four years, after rounding up several hundreds suspects.
The separatists are thought to be trying to split the Muslims, who make up the great majority in the area, away from any allegiance to the majority Buddhist administration.
Many Muslims are caught between fear of the insurgents, respect for their culture and the demands for loyalty from Bangkok. Most deaths have been of Muslims.
When three army intelligence officers allegedly working for the separatists were interrogated they implicated the seven policemen, who are now being questioned at a Pattani army camp, the report said.
Thailand's so-called deep South, comprising the three border provinces Narathiwat, Pattani and Yala, has been in turmoil since January 2004 when Muslim militants raided an army arms depot in Narathiwat and stole more than 300 war weapons, unleashing a military crackdown on the long-simmering separatist movement.
The region has seen a surge in violence ever since, with more than 2,600 people falling victim to clashes, shooting, bombings and beheadings.
Nearly 80 per cent of the 2 million people living in the three southernmost provinces of predominantly Buddhist Thailand profess to be Muslims.
The three-province area, which borders Malaysia, was an independent Islamic sultanate known as Pattani for hundreds of years before being conquered by Bangkok in 1786. The area came under direct rule of the Thai bureaucracy in 1902.
A separatist struggle took off in the 1950s, fuelled by government efforts to suppress the local culture and religion.
