DPM to visit Thai far South

BANGKOK, July 17 (TNA) - Deputy Prime Minister Police General Pracha Promnok is scheduled to visit the Thai far South on July 21 to boost morale of local officers in the troubled Thai deep South. Police General Pracha, who is in charge of national security, told reporters of his planned trip to the southernmost Thai region on Wednesday, after a latest bomb attack in Yala Province earlier in the day. Early Wednesday morning's explosion wounded both legs of a 31 year-old ranger during his patrol on foot to provide safeguard for local teachers along a rural road in Baan Sanambin of Yala's Bannang Sata district. According to the deputy prime minister, the attack appeared to be the work of a splinter insurgent group, not that of the Barisan Revolusi Nasional (BRN) insurgency movement, which declared truce during the ongoing Ramadan annual fasting period of Muslims, and there is no need to, thus, contact the Malaysian government to help mediate peace talks with any splinter group. Despite the latest bombing attack, the Thai deputy premier insisted that the Thai government will press ahead with every effort considered to help improve the situation in the insurgency-hit Thai far South. (TNA)