A series of bombings struck five provinces in Thailand, mostly at sites popular with tourists, on Thursday and Friday, in what a senior Thai official called a coordinated wave of attacks. “There are restrictions and checks on local travel, including on the road between Bangkok and Hua Hin”, the statement continued.
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In an earlier media conference, the Thai Police blamed “local sabotage” as the cause behind the violent incidents and ruled out any links to worldwide terrorism.
The attacks followed a successful referendum held last weekend on a new constitution that critics say will bolster the military’s power for years to come.
According to the police, they had intelligence pointing to imminent attacks, but did not have details of when and where they would be carried out.
Even as police searched for suspects and fears of more bombs continued, locals said the explosions will be a blow to tourism, a critical source of income.
Germany’s Foreign Ministry said that three German citizens were among the injured.
In just a day, a series of bombs hit Thailand. “I will not tell you in which province”, he said. And two bombs exploded outside a market in Phang Na, damaging two vehicles but causing no casualties. Friday morning, twin bombs went off in Surat Thani, and other explosions hit Trang, Phang Nga and Phuket. “Everyone was screaming, the glass broken, table broken, confusion”, the Italian said Friday from a Hua Hin hospital bed, a place he never expected to turn 51. 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 vehicle 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.
The second blast killed a Thai woman and injured about 20 people.
“It is still unclear which group is behind the bombings”, the spokesperson said, though he dismissed speculation that Muslim rebels waging a rebellion in Thailand’s far south were behind the recent attacks.
General Sithichai Srisopacharoenrath, the superintendent of police in Hua Hin, said the bombs were hidden inside pot plants and set off by remote control, half an hour apart.
All of the bombs were reportedly detonated by mobile phone signals.
In a televised address yesterday, Prime Minister Prayut Chan-ocha said: “This act has severely hurt the entire Thai country”.
The country’s national security environment is largely influenced by ethno-nationalist conflict in southern Thailand where extremists are ethnic Thai-Malay Muslims not now linked to global terrorism.
The timing is important here: Friday is a national holiday marking both Queen Sirikit’s birthday and Mother’s Day, a day of celebration and events around the country.
Former prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra, who was forced from office by the military in 2014, denounced the attacks, describing them as inhumane.
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Small improvised bomb attacks have frequently been used in Thailand at times of political unrest, but since the military took power in a coup in May 2014 such attacks have been extremely rare.
