Police are investigating a series of bomb blasts in Hu.
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Visitors to Thailand are being warned to be cautious after a series of bomb attacks in which four people died.
Police said the motive behind the bombings was still unclear, but stressed it was not connected to a simmering insurgency in Thailand’s south, as some analysts have suggested.
(AP Photo/Penny Yi Wang).
A wave of co-ordinated explosions rattled multiple cities across southern Thailand, killing at least four people and wounding dozens more, police said Friday.
The attacks came ahead of a long weekend celebrating the Queen’s birthday, and just days after a referendum approved a new constitution giving more power to the military Government for years to come.
But the violence appeared aimed at undermining the country’s tourism industry, which provides vital income to the government.
One small bomb exploded on a beach in Patong on the island of Phuket and four others went off in the seaside resort of Hua Hin, emptying the streets.
Police said four were from Germany, two from Italy and one from Austria.
Police said earlier they were investigating all leads, but had ruled out links to global militant groups. “Anyone who is a former prime minister is anxious about the country and would not do such evil”, said Noppadon, who served in both Shinawatras’ cabinets.
Police said that in addition to the blasts, firebombs triggered blazes at markets and shops in six places, including Phuket, Trang, Surat Thani, Phang Nga and a souvenir shop in the tourist town of Ao Nang in the seaside province Krabi, known for its limestone cliffs.
In a speech Wednesday night, junta chief and Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha on Wednesday night took credit for bringing stability back to Thailand after an extended period of unrest.
Police said they found evidence at his home and in electronic devices they had confiscated from him that he was involved in an active political movement against the government.
Ethnic Malay militants fighting for greater autonomy in Thailand’s far south have launched attacks there almost every day for a more than a decade.
Thai police patrol the area near the Erawan Shrine, the site of a bombing in August 2015 that left 20 dead and scores injured, in the center of Bangkok on Saturday as authorities increase security following a new string of bomb attacks in Thailand. Thai authorities said that bombing was revenge by a people-smuggling gang whose activities were disrupted by a crackdown, but analysts said it might have been the work of Uighur separatists angry that Thailand forcibly repatriated more than 100 Uighurs to China.
The United States, Britain, Australia and several other countries issued travel warnings to their nationals. Although their targets have overwhelmingly been confined to Thailand’s three southernmost provinces, the militants have apparently carried out isolated attacks elsewhere – detonating, for example, a auto bomb in the underground parking lot of a mall on the tourist island of Koh Samui in April 2015 that wounded at least seven people.
“We feel pretty safe”.
Col. Sansern Kaewkamnerd, a junta spokesman, said Prayuth “expressed his sadness over the unexpected and tragic incident (in Hua Hin)” and ordered police and soldiers in the area to step up security measures.
Carl Suensson, 68, from Sweden, said Saturday that “today it’s pretty OK, but yesterday was scary”.
“We follow the news 24 hours”.
Then on Thursday night, attackers in Hua Hin hid bombs on a busy street filled with bars and restaurants, planting them inside two potted plants and were detonated by remote control about half an hour apart. In this Thursday, Aug. 11, 2016, photo, rescue workers help an unidentified woman after a bomb blast in the southern resort city of Hua Hin, 240 kilometers (150 miles) south of Bangkok, Thailand.
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In the recent referendum voters in both Shinawatras’ northeast stronghold and in three mostly Muslim southern provinces voted against the new constitution, while the rest of the country accepted the terms.
