Militants Launch Attacks in Southern Thailand

Several soldiers wounded

BANGKOK: Militants in Thailand's Muslim-majority south carried out a wave of coordinated attacks Friday, wounding several soldiers and hoisting the Malaysian flag across the restive region, officials said.

August 31 marks Malaysia's independence from British rule and commemorates the founding of Bersatu—the umbrella organisation for militants in Thailand's southernmost provinces believed to want greater autonomy.

Three military rangers and two marines were wounded in bomb blasts, an army spokesman said, adding that more than one hundred "symbolic attacks" took place across the southern provinces of Songkhla, Pattani, Yala and Narathiwat.