Ranger killed by bomb planted in hismother's grave in Yala, father also hurt
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A CONCEALED bomb was detonated at a graveyard in Yala's Muang district as a paramilitary ranger and his father prayed at the grave of his mother yesterday morning.
The blast immediately killed Saikh Jehdoma, who worked for Ranger Taskforce 43, and injured his 63-year-old father Azi Jehdoma. The corpse of Saikh’s mother was blown out of the grave.
Police said Saikh’s mother passed away on December 10, and Saikh and Azi visited the graveyard yesterday to pray for her.
“We believe the bombers might have been hiding nearby and detonated the hidden bomb when they saw the victims praying unsuspectingly,” a police spokesman said.
He said police had identified a suspect, Rorki Dorloh, who had previously been accused of other bombings, as possibly being behind the attack that targeted Saikh. The ranger may have been a target because he had carried out intelligence operations for authorities, police said.
The district’s chief Kongsakun Jantaraj condemned the bomb attack.
“Locals are all distressed,” he said. “Such things should have never happened.”
Thailand’s southernmost region including Yala province has been struggling with violent unrest for more than a decade.
In the neighbouring province of Narathiwat, police are trying to track down the culprits behind another bomb attack on Saturday.
Pol Lt Colonel Janjira Yodrak, a deputy chief of Narathiwat’s forensic science unit, and her team were targeted by a motorcycle bomb while they were travelling in pick-up trucks on a work trip on Saturday morning.
No one was injured and the bomb only caused minor damage to the vehicles.
The superintendent of the Tak Bai police station, Colonel Jiradej Phrasawang, said the motorcycle used in the bomb attack was reported stolen on March 8.
“We are now working on recordings from closed-circuit cameras,” he said. “They show a man acting suspiciously near the blast scene. But we have to improve the quality of the recordings before we can compare the picture of the suspect against the database of security cases.”
