<div><em>Thailand’s assimilation policy in the past 80 years on the Muslim Malay in Thailand’s three southern border provinces, known as Patani, has been repeatedly cited as one of the main reasons for the armed struggle, claiming almost 6500 lives already. Due to this uncompromising assimilation policy, the state of the Malay language in Patani has become very weak and marginalized. As the peace process has progressed, concerns about the linguistic rights of the local people have been raised and will be included in discussions at the dialogue table.&nbsp;</em></div> <p></p>

<div>The liberation movement engaged in armed struggle for the independence of the three southernmost provinces has always cited Thailand’s assimilation policy and its discrimination against the use of local Malay language as one of the main reasons of the armed struggle.&nbsp;The policy of language discrimination in Thailand dates back at least 80 years ago.&nbsp;These decreed that Thai nationals, whatever their ethnicity, must speak Thai, learn Thai in school. This greatly affected people in the Deep South whose first language is Malay.Due to this uncompromising assimilation policy, the state of Malay in Patani has become very weak and marginalized. Hara Shintaro, an expert in Malay and&nbsp;and fierce critic of Deep South politics discusses how&nbsp;the language, Malay identity and violent conflict are intertwined</div> <p></p>

<div>Muslims all over the world are observing their religious duty of fasting during the holy month, Ramadan. Hostility being prohibited during this month, many people have the naive hope that the conflict situation in Patani, or the Muslim-majority southernmost provinces of Thailand, will improve at least temporarily. </div>

<p dir="ltr">Second part of Hara Shintaro's analysis on the Pondok Jihad phenomena in Thailand's restive Deep South.</p> <p></p>

<h2>&nbsp;</h2> <h2>Part 1: Chronology&nbsp;</h2> <div>&nbsp;</div> <div>It is not unusual for Patani Malay Muslims to receive a bilingual invitation card printed both in Thai and Malay (in Jawi script) for a fund raising tea party, usually organized by a local mosque, aimed at collecting donations from well-wishers. These events, called ‘makae the’ (drinking tea) in the local Malay dialect, are often held as one of the most effective traditional ways of public fund raising in the community. </div>

<div> <div><em>Hara Shintaro observes ISIS fad in Thailand's restive Deep South, and gives very insightful views on the similarities and differences between the Patani freedom movements and the pan-Islamism jihadist movements.&nbsp;</em> </div></div>

<div>Hara Shintaro analyses weakness of the Deep South peace process and suggest ways to move forward productively.&nbsp;</div> <p></p>

<div>Given the circumstances in the south where the draconian special laws (martial law, the Emergency Decree and the Internal Security Act, all of which violate very basic human rights to different extents) have been imposed for more than ten years now (compared to just six months for the rest of the country), there is no proper and official communication channel for the non-state armed groups (NSAGs, which despite their official protests are often referred to as separatists by both the Siamese colonialists/Thai governments and Thai media). </div>

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