Driver slain in front of kids

THE SOUTH

Suspected insurgents have shot dead a Pattani school bus driver in front of kindergarten children he was picking up.

Mama Mina, 52, was shot dead yesterday when he got off the bus to help the children to get on board. He had been picking up the youngsters on Sai Bor Tong-Muang Tia Road in Pattani's Nong Chik district, police said. None of the children were injured.

His murder followed an attack on Monday on a pickup truck in Pattani's Panare district used to transport children to school.

Three students, two male vocational school students and one female secondary school student, were wounded in Monday's incident.

Police have detained a man in connection with the attack.

In Pattani's Khok Pho district, a team of police and military officers killed six suspected insurgents in a gunfight after they tried to escape a raid on their house in Ban Pru Jud in tambon Kuan Nori.

Sgt Chalermpong Koksri and Sgt Sorachai Chaichompu were injured in the clash, police said.

In another development, suspected insurgent Abduloh Deng, 30, accused in the killing of teacher Supawadi Tangprasom, was arrested in a raid on a house in Pattani's Mayo district, police said at a press conference yesterday. Mr Abduloh denied the charge.