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Crushing or suffocation kills at least 78 Muslim detainees in Thailand




About 1,300 were
arrested after riot and
packed into trucks

PATTANI, Thailand - At least 78 Muslim detainees suffocated or were fatally
crushed Monday, when police rounded up 1,300 people and packed them into trucks
after a riot in southern Thailand.

On Tuesday, Islamic leaders accused the authorities of overreacting and warned
that the deaths could worsen sectarian violence.

Monday's violence started after protesters outside a police station demanded
the release of six Muslim men accused of giving weapons to Islamic separatists.
In all, six people were shot to death, apparently by security forces.

As rumors of the suffocations circulated but before the 78 deaths were
officially announced, Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra tried to blame the
casualties on dawn-to-dusk fasting in the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.

"There are some who died because they were fasting, and they were crammed in
tight" in the trucks, Thaksin said. "It's a matter of their bodies becoming
weak. Nobody did anything to them."

But the death toll shocked moderate Muslim leaders. They accused security
forces of overreacting - a charge they have repeatedly made as the government
has failed to halt the violence. So far this year, the unrest has taken more
than 400 lives in the Muslim-dominated south.



Although Thailand is overwhelmingly Buddhist, its three southern provinces have
a Muslim majority. Violence there has been an old story for decades but has
worsened this year. Residents claim they are discriminated against by the
central government.

As news of the disaster spread on Tuesday, six people suffered gunshot wounds
in separate attacks. The victims included an assistant village chief and her
husband.

The army earlier declared a curfew in Narathiwat, with Thaksin calling the
situation volatile.

The dead were among 1,300 people arrested after six hours of skirmishing with
authorities. Witnesses saw the prisoners stripped to the waist. With their
hands tied behind their backs, they were herded onto trucks to be driven to
army camps.

Military and Justice Ministry officials said Tuesday that 78 of those
transported on the trucks died during the journey. Most suffocated in the crush
of people piled atop one another. Some were kept in the trucks for as long as
six hours.

Forensics expert Pornthip Rojanasunan of the Justice Ministry said most had
perished from suffocation and some from dehydration. Army Maj. Gen. Sinchai
Nujsathit said suffocations had occurred "because we had more than 1,300 people
packed into the six-wheel trucks."

Lt. Gen. Pisarn Wattanawongkhiri said 25 army trucks and others hired from
private contractors had been used to transport the detainees.

Like the prime minister, Manit Suthaporn of the Justice Ministry said religious
fasting had contributed to the deaths. "This, combined with the heat - they
were in the trucks for five to six hours, and it was crowded," Manit said.

Neighboring Malaysia is a predominantly Muslim country with close ethnic and
cultural links to Thailand's southern Muslims. The Malaysian government
expressed concern over Monday's crackdown.

The death toll was the highest since April 28, when police and soldiers killed
107 militants who attacked police posts with machetes in a vain attempt to
seize firearms.



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