Prominent human rights activist shot dead in Thai Deep South

A prominent human rights activist in Thailand’s insurgency-wracked Deep South was shot dead at his home in Pattani province by two unidentified gunmen with military-grade weapons, authorities said Wednesday.

Roning Dolah, a coordinator for Duay Jai (With Heart), a civil society organization, was gunned down in front of his family at their house in Yaring district on Tuesday night, officials said.

“Two assailants approached from behind the house and opened fire with military-grade firearms on Roning while he was resting with his family,” said Police Capt. Suwan Naksanga, an investigator at the Yaring Police Station. “He was hit in the torso and died at the scene.”

Authorities found seven 7.62-mm bullet casings and one 5.56-mm casing at the crime scene. A police investigation is ongoing.

“We were sitting in front of the house when we heard gunshots. The assailants … dressed in black similar to paramilitary rangers shot him and fled,” Roning’s widow, Milah Kuteh, told BenarNews.

Col. Ekwarit Chobchuphon, spokesman for the Internal Security Operations Command (ISOC) Region 4 Forward Command, cautioned against drawing conclusions about the alleged perpetrators of the killing.

“When incidents occur and the culprits can’t be found, these groups often try to implicate state officials,” he said, adding that members of violent groups in the region often disguise themselves as members of state forces.

Anchana Heemmina, Duay Jai president, expressed concern over the timing of the attack, which happened weeks before an August committee-level meeting on peace talks in Malaysia between the Thai government and Barisan Revolusi Nasional (BRN), the main rebel group in the Deep South.

“Why does violence occur after several rounds of peace talks for the southern border provinces?” said Heemmina, a member of the Thai House of Representatives’ Special Committee on Southern Border Peace.

Heemmina said that Roning, 45, had also been a victim of torture by military forces when he was detained five times in Pattani province.

Meanwhile, human rights watchdog group Amnesty International called on the Thai authorities to conduct a prompt, transparent, and independent probe into Roning’s death.

“Such an investigation is essential not only for delivering justice for Roning and his loved ones but also to prevent this incident from having a chilling effect on human rights activism in this region of Thailand,” Chanatip Tatiyakaroonwong, a Thailand researcher with Amnesty, said in a statement.

Separatist rebels operate in the southernmost provinces of Buddhist-majority Thailand where the population is mainly Malay Muslim. 

There have been over 22,200 violent incidents in the border region since the decades-old insurgency campaign reignited in early 2004, resulting in more than 7,540 deaths and 14,000 injuries, according to the Deep South Watch, a think-tank.

The violence continues despite the Thai government having allocated approximately 500 billion baht (U.S. $14 billion) to address issues in the southern border provinces for the past two decades.