Suspect in murder of two monks arrested

An image of Phra Khru Prachote Rattananurak is placed by his coffin during a chanting rite at Wat Rattananupap in Sungai Padi district in Narathiwat, where he was murdered on Jan 18.

NARATHIWAT: A man suspected of involvement in the murder of two monks in Sungai Padi district last month has been arrested.

Yuhari Sama-ae was arrested on Sunday. (Photo released by police)

Police said Yuhari Sama-ae, 30, was arrested at 5.30am on Sunday by a combined team of military and police officers after he crossed the Sungai Kolok River by boat from Malaysia to Ban Paluka in tambon Khosit of Tak Bai district.

Members of the government force were deployed along the river from Sungai Kolok to Tak Bai districts on information that the man would return from hiding in Malaysia through a natural border crossing across the river.

An arrest warrant had been issued for Mr Yuhari, a member of a Muslim militant group.

He was suspected of involvement in a brazen attack on Jan 18 when a group of armed militants broke into Wat Rattananupap and shot to death Phra Khru Prachote Rattananurak, the temple abbot and monastic chief of Sungai Padi, and another monk.

Mr Yuhari was also a suspect in an ambush on a road near Ban Kwalosila in Sungai Kolok district on Feb 4 in which Pol Sgt Muhamad Faisal Mayako, 29, of a Sungai Kolok police station, was wounded. A stray bullet also hit and killed a villager who was passing by on a motorcycle.

The suspect is being detained under martial law for questioning and further legal action.