Talk of Thailand introducing Shari'ah law in southern Thailand

INTERNATIONAL HERALD TRIBUNE: YALA, Thailand After two and a half years of ceaseless violence and more than 1,700 people killed, the wary residents of the southernmost provinces of Thailand are expressing measured optimism that the government installed by the military will help ease one of the most intractable conflicts in Asia.

Although daily killings by insurgents continue here, just a few hundred kilometers from the country's tourist- filled beaches, the new government is showing a softer touch, agreeing to peace talks with Muslim insurgents and working to revive a system that allowed local politicians and religious leaders to take part in setting policies.

Thailand also appears to be encouraging a rapprochement with neighboring Malaysia on the issue of the insurgency, which at times has divided the two countries. On Wednesday, Prime Minister Surayud Chulanont will visit Kuala Lumpur, where government officials have said they are willing to serve as mediators.

"The attitude of the new government is certainly much more positive toward dealing with the south, not through the use of force but through having a dialogue, a discussion," said Mahathir bin Mohamad, the former Malaysian prime minister who was frequently critical of the previous government's handling of the insurgency.

Muslim leaders in Thailand are debating proposals that would give them a special status in predominantly Buddhist Thailand. Nimu Makaje, a Muslim scholar in this violence-racked southern city, enthusiastically tells a visitor that the time has come to implement an Islamic legal system in southern Thailand. New hopes in Thailand's restive south by Thomas Fuller

Mark Alexander