Militants shot dead four soldiers and wounded two others early Saturday in Thailand’s volatile south, an army spokesman said, as a surge in violence since the start of Ramadan continued. The group of six soldiers were attacked as they patrolled a road in the Mayo district of Pattani province. “About 20 armed militants on three pick up trucks opened fire at a team of soldiers once they get close to them,” Colonel Pramote Prom-in, southern army spokesman, told AFP. Pramote said four soldiers were killed in the attack and two more were wounded as they returned fire. The incident came after a roadside bomb killed five policemen in nearby Yala province on Wednesday. A shadowy insurgency, without clearly stated aims, has raged in Thailand’s three southernmost provinces — Pattani, Narathiwat and Yala — since 2004. Daily bomb or gun attacks have targeted soldiers and civilians, Buddhists and Muslims, claiming more than 5,000 lives in eight years. A state of emergency is in force in the worst-affected parts of the region which rights campaigners say gives tens of thousands of military troops based there legal immunity, fuelling rights abuses.
