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[Archie]

[attachmentid=496] I think this picture and its caption tells you how things are going in the south these days, regardless of what Bangkok officials claim:

"Monks arrive at a military air base in Songkhla on Friday. They were divided to stay at several temples in Pattani during Buddhist's Lent as many monks abandoned the temple following daily violence."

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[Hedda]

One of the great long term demographic problems that the Bangkok government is facing in trying to end the southern insurgency is the continuing flight of Buddhists from the southern provinces. Some of these folks were originally shipped into the south from Issan in an attempt to populate the area with Thai Buddhists, as a political counter-point to the dominant Malay Islamic majority. As the conflict drones on, and more and more of the Buddhists move out to safer areas, the political power of the indigenous Malay people grows, making a political solution to the problem even more difficult. You couldn't find a better example of the problem than to see the Thai army flying in monks to staff temples abandoned by other local monks.