Prayuth regrets shooting

The general, who asked for public sympathy for his subordinates, said an investigation into the incident was under way and anyone found at fault for not following the rules of engagement would be punished.

“If everyone wants security and order, but doesn’t want the existence of rules of engagement or the presence of the military, I’d like to ask whether that is possible. If it is, like if Bangkok were to have no police, then the military would pull out from the South,” he said. 

“Don’t make an issue out of this. I am making a statement about the incident and the issue based on facts, not siding with my subordinates,” he added.

Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra said the government would ensure justice applied to all parties in Sunday’s incident. 

If the dead were really innocent, the authorities would take care of their cases, but at this stage, the Army will conduct an investigation to establish the facts, she said.

As a result of Sunday’s events, two locally recruited rangers’ companies were yesterday ordered to relocate, being replaced by a ranger unit from Nakhon Ratchasima. 

The 4302nd and 4306th companies are normally based in the Pattani district of Nong Chik with troops recruited from local communities, while the replacement 2206th ranger company is a northeastern elite unit that will initially be based at Phya Inthira camp.

Meanwhile, relatives of the five villagers killed, including one who died yesterday morning from wound trauma, yesterday met with military officers and Fourth Army Area commander LtGeneral Udomchai Thammasarojrat to discuss further compensation measures in addition to the Bt100,000 given initially to each of the families of those killed, and Bt10,000 to each of the three others wounded in the shooting.

Udomchai promised the relatives a fair and thorough investigation into the shooting, said Army spokesman Colonel Sansern Kaewkamnerd. 

Sansern said the key points to be scrutinised were whether the rangers had followed the rules of engagement, whether they had used excessive force upon deciding to engage the situation, and whether shots had been fired from the pickup in which the nine villagers, including one person who was unscathed, were travelling.

Speaking to the media later in the day, Udomchai called on members of the public in the South to be aware of the insurgents’ tactic of using innocent civilians as shields to further instigate division between the authorities and residents. 

According to sources in the Interior Ministry, the Army and the police, the shooting was carried out by a group of rangers after a heated argument had broken out with the occupants of the truck. A weapon was planted in the vehicle to make it seem that they were insurgents, the sources said. 

This version of events is at odds with comments made on Monday by Deputy Prime Minister Yuthasak Sasiprapha, who said: “Why, if those killed and wounded were indeed villagers, were a number of war weapons found in the pickup?”

“If they were villagers on the way to say prayers, why were they running away when asked to stop?” he added.

“It was purely emotion that led to this. They were in a shouting match,” said the sources, whose accounts match the villagers’ version but contradict a number of senior military officials and Yuthasak, who pretty much concluded that the shooting was justified.

According to the sources, the truck, which they said was carrying funeralgoers, was stopped by a group of paramilitary rangers at one location and instructed to take a detour, because half an hour prior to that a group of insurgents had fired four M79 grenades into their base camp. 

Only one of the grenades exploded, said one of the sources.

“Some lives could have been saved [if the military had acted differently in regard to the shooting],” said Angkhana Neelaphaijit, head of the Justice for Peace Foundation. 

“There has to be a thorough investigation into this. A simple DNA check would reveal who planted the weapons in the truck. The military have lied to the people in the past about the killings in the deep South,” she added.