More than 500 Muslim villagers gathered at southern Thailand’s Sabaiyoi town March 18 to demand justice after a midnight attack on an Islamic school left two young students dead and eight wounded. Students were asleep at the boarding school when… Read moreThailand: who is behind school-house attack?
From AP, March 16: NORTHAMPTON – Maha Ghosananda, a Nobel Peace Prize-nominated monk who rebuilt Buddhism in Cambodia after the fall of the Khmer Rouge, has died. Ghosananda, who lived in Leverett and Providence, R.I., was believed to be in… Read moreGhosananda, “Gandhi of Cambodia,” dies in Massachusetts
Rear Admiral Paul Zukunft of the US Joint Inter-Agency Task Force-West claimed evidence that secret laboratories for producing methamphetamine are operating in areas of the Phiilippines where Maoist and Islamic rebels have a strong presence, and that the guerillas are… Read moreNarco-guerillas in the Philippines?
Eight Thai civilians—all Buddhists—were killed in the troubled south of Thailand when their van was shot upon by suspected Islamist guerrillas March 15. Thai security officials suspect that the attack was meant coincide with the founding of the National Revolutionary… Read moreDeadly separatist attack in southern Thailand
Australia’s military adventure in East Timor is starting to smell more like a small counterinsurgency war than a “peacekeeping” mission—if the world were paying any attention. From Catholic News, March 14: Timor priest accuses Aussie troops As fugitive Timorese rebel… Read moreEast Timor: headed towards counter-insurgency?
Australian “peacekeeping” troops killed four in a raid on rebels in East Timor March 4, but their leader Alfredo Reinado escaped. Reinado, who deserted the army last year and is wanted for his alleged role in deadly clashes that brought… Read moreDisplacement crisis, growing Australian intervention in East Timor
Anti-war protesters clashed with police in Sydney Feb. 22 before the arrival of US Vice President Dick Cheney. Seven people were arrested as mounted police attempted to bar hundreds from marching through Australia’s largest city, demanding Prime Minister John Howard… Read moreAussies protest Cheney, Iraq war; troops kill in East Timor
Thailand was shaken by a string of simultaneous terror blasts on the Christian New Year, and now again on the Chinese New Year. The Jan. 1 blasts in Bangkok are still murky, but the Feb. 17 blasts in the heavily… Read moreThailand terror and the Year of the Pig
Leaders of the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), meeting in the Philippine city of Cebu, are working on a regional anti-terror pact the day after a series of bombs exploded in nearby towns on the southern Mindanao island…. Read morePhilippines: terror tops ASEAN summit, rights activists protest
From Bangkok’s The Nation, Jan. 4: Blasts shatter hopes for reconciliation The bomb blasts that hit Bangkok on New Year’s Eve signalled that the worst is yet to come. The explosions, which killed three people and injured almost 40, were… Read moreConspiracy theories abound in Thailand terror
From the Brunei Times, Nov. 9: Surayud eyes autonomy for Thai south Thailand’s military-appointed prime minister, whose visit to the troubled deep South yesterday sparked a new wave of violence, is mulling to allow the rule of sharia law in… Read moreSharia law for Thailand?
A new military operation on Mindanao and growing impetus for a sweeping “anti-terrorism” bill in Manila, both aimed at the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF)—which denies involvement in the terror blasts which have targeted markets and other public places, leaving… Read moreMindanao militarized in wake of terror wave
