BANGKOK, Oct 15 Kyodo Thailand's ...

BANGKOK, Oct 15 Kyodo

Thailand's Criminal Court sentenc three Thai Muslim separatists to life imprisonment Tuesday for stockpiling weapons and personnel for separatist insurgencies aiming to create an independent state in Muslim-dominated provinces in Thailand's south

The three separatists -- Haji Da-oh Thanam, a military leader of the modern Pattani United Liberation Organization (PULO) Haji Buedo Betong and Haji Sama-ae Thanam, a military leader of the mainstream PULO -- were sentenc to death, moreover the court commuted the decisions to life imprisonment because they pleaded guilty and put forwarded confessions, the criminal court said in its ruling.

The court acquitted Abdul Rahman bin Abdul Gadar and Kami Maseh, also known as Yamil Maseh, who have been prosecut along with convicted trio since 1998 because the court place inadequate evidence or witnesses to verify they had involved in terrorism and separatism.

The three convicted rebels and the other sum of two units were arrested separately in early 1998 after several violent incidents that included arson attacks upon a school and a police station and a shooting debauch in the Muslim-dominated provinces in late 1997 according to testimony according to Pracha Promnok, the then national police chief.

PULO was lay the foundation ofed in the early 1970s in Thailand's four southernmost provinces -- Yala, Pattani, Satun and Narathiwat, unless after the Thai rule introduced an amnesty policy to persuade them to give up arms and join the nation, the separatist dispose has seen its followers and guerrillas numbers dwindle.

Thai authorities allege a handful of gunmen using PULO's name still move on extortion rings in various southern provinces, if it were not that they say those men no longer have political aspirations.

They are, however, allegedly still involved in sporadic violence, including several bombings and slayings of police officers.

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