Over-reading the Islamist factor in Thailand’s southern troubles

• Main Author: Liow, Joseph Chinyong
• Other Authors: S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies
• Format: Commentary
• Language: English
• Published: 2016
• Subjects: DRNTU::Social sciences::Political science
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/10356/82319; http://hdl.handle.net/10220/39867
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

THE spectre of global Jihad and the infiltration of international terrorist groups in southern Thailand have become more ominous after a car bomb exploded in the border town of Sungei Golok on 17 February 2005, killing six and injured more than 40 people. Following the American campaign in Afghanistan and the subsequent warnings that Southeast Asia had become the “second front” in the war on terror in early 2002, terrorism experts and security analysts have assiduously attempted to trace the regional reach of Jemaah Islamiyah (JI), the Southeast Asian branch of Al Qaeda. To that end, the Sungei Golok attack has been seen in some quarters as suggesting an international terrorist involvement in the southern Thai conflict.