Police were searching Friday for clues to who set off two small bombs in Thailand’s popular seaside resort town of Hua Hin, leaving at least one person dead and 20 others injured. The city is home to a swath of beachfront resorts as well as a royal palace. Four people were killed and dozens wounded, police said.
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The blasts erupted on the eve of Queen Sirikit’s 84th birthday, which is also celebrated as Mother’s Day in Thailand.
The explosions all occurred south of Bangkok and several of the blasts – including one on Patong beach in the tourist resort of Phuket – appeared created to hit the tourism industry.
Trang is on the fringes of Thailand’s deep south, where a low-level Muslim separatist insurgency had killed more than 5,000 people since 2004.
He said that Thailand had no conflict over race and religions among ethnic minorities or was under threat linked to Islamic State terrorism.
The first bomb exploded in the southern province of Trang – an area full of lovely beaches and tourist islands – killing one person and injuring six, according to police.
Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha called on Thai citizens to “band together and stay strong”, according to the wire service.
Reports late Thursday night on the web sites of the Thai Rath newspaper and other media said the bombs were hidden in planters on a busy street with open-front bars.
Thailand’s military seized power in a coup two years ago, enacting sweeping powers to control dissent.
“Hua Hin has never had a problem like this”, Nai Amporn, the owner of a beachside restaurant, told AFP.
No one has claimed responsibility for the blasts and it is not clear if they are connected.
“This is exactly the same modus operandi that Patani Malay insurgents have been using for well over a decade in the three provinces”, Mr Anthony Davis, an analyst with IHS Jane’s, told The Straits Times.
Southern militants fighting for greater autonomy have carried out sophisticated, coordinated attacks before, but most have hit three provinces in the far south that were not among those targeted this week. These were the first such attacks since a bombing last August at a famous shrine in the heart of Bangkok that killed 20 people. Hours earlier, a bombing near a market in Trang province killed one person and wounded six.
Investigators say some of the bombs were detonated by mobile telephone sim cards purchased in Malaysia. Pol. Lt Chaiyot Tisawong, an officer in Hua Hin, said 10 of the injured were foreigners.
In hardest-hit Hua Hin, a popular beach resort rocked by four bombs in 24 hours, locals braced for a blow to the town’s mainstay industry ahead of peak tourist season.
Separate blasts were reported elsewhere in the south on Friday morning.
At 9 a.m., there were two explosions at Bang Niang Market in Phang Nga province’s Takua Pa district.
“It is typical where all the foreign tourists really go, so it looks like they were aiming to get as many foreigners as possible”.
At 8 a.m., two bombs went off near Surat Thani Police Station and Surat Thani Marine Police Station, where a ceremony for the Queen’s birthday was held.
Thaksin’s ouster set off sometimes bloody battles for power between his supporters and opponents, who include the military.
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The explosions came days after Sunday’s referendum, which saw 61.35 per cent of Thais vote in favour of a draft Constitution that will shrink the power of elected parliamentarians vis-a-vis appointed ones, even as it paves the way for elections next year. The government of his sister Yingluck Shinawatra, who became prime minister in 2011, was ousted in the country’s last coup in 2014. It was for years the favourite seaside retreat of King Bhumibol Adulyadej, the world’s longest reigning monarch.
