By Darren Schuettler
BANGKOK (Reuters) - Thailand feared a spike in violence inits Muslim deep south on Friday after an unknown rebel groupannounced a "ceasefire" dismissed by analysts as a hoax likelyto enrage real fighters on the ground.
The surprise announcement by the Thailand United SouthernUnderground on Thursday was rubbished by security experts andex-army commanders who said its leaders had no influence in theregion, where more than 3,000 people have been killed since2004.
"It's a hoax and it could make matters much worse," SunaiPhasuk of Human Rights Watch told Reuters.
"People in the south are angry and depressed. They expectthere will be more attacks because local rebel commanders willtake it as an insult to their struggle," he said.
Former army officers in the region said the "ceasefire",which an ex-defence minister said he had negotiated with 11insurgent groups, expressed similar fears.
"Active groups may intensify their attacks on troops andcivilians to show that they don't listen to this group," KittiRattanachaya, a former southern army commander, told Thai TV.
The shadowy rebels have never revealed themselves publiclyor claimed responsibility for the near daily bomb and gunattacks in the major rubber-producing region borderingMalaysia.
Three hours after Thursday's broadcast, rebels wounded onesoldier in an ambush in Yala, one of three southernmostprovinces where Malay Muslims make up the majority of thepopulation.
"We won't let our guard down because of that ceasefireclaim," army spokesman Colonel Acra Tiproch said of the 30,000soldiers and police fighting the low-level insurgency.
"DON'T HOLD YOUR BREATH"
Army chief General Anupong Paochinda identified the group'sleader as Malipeng Khan, a separatist active in the 1980s whohad failed to unify insurgent factions. He said Bangkok wouldnot negotiate with the group.
"I or other state officials do not have the power tonegotiate with a group regarded as having broken Thai law, whoare legally regarded as criminals," he told Channel 7 TV.
Separatist rebels waged a low-level guerrilla war in thedensely forested region throughout the 1970s and 1980s, buttheir campaign petered out in the 1990s after an amnesty offer.
That struggle was dominated by groups such as the PattaniUnited Liberation Organisation (PULO), largely dormant sincethe 1980s, with some of its leaders now living abroad.
The old guard has been replaced by a new generation ofrebel leaders and groups such as the BRN Coordinate, whichanalysts say is most responsible for the current violence.
"Don't hold your breath. This is not the real deal," U.S.professor and security expert Zachary Abuza wrote on a blog.
"Members of PULO have attempted to speak on behalf of theinsurgents and negotiate with the government in the past. Thishas always led to a spike in violence and attacks on theprevious generation of militants."
Thailand's Nation newspaper, which published a storyheadlined "Hope or Hoax", quoted a PULO official as saying theyknew nothing of the men who announced the ceasefire on Thai TV.
Bangkok has flirted with talks with separatist groupsbefore, but most analysts saw no pressure on the rebels toaccept an unconditional ceasefire while Thai security forcesstruggle to find a strategy to stop the violence.
Former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra's flip-floppingbetween heavy-handed crackdowns and offers of millions ofdollars in development aid to one of Thailand's poorest regionsfailed to calm the region.
After Thaksin was ousted in a 2006 coup, then PrimeMinister Surayud Chulanont apologised for Thaksin's iron-fistapproach, but his "hearts and minds" campaign had little impacteither.
(Additional reporting by Panarat Thepgumpanat and NoppornWong-Anan; Editing by Alex Richardson)
