Four Islamic teachers suspected of organising separatist violence in southern Thailand appeared in court on Friday to face terrorism charges, as a security source warned of major planned attacks on Bangkok.

As the four were flown from the Muslim-dominated deep south to the capital where a criminal court remanded them in custody, Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra said a suspect who eluded capture this week was the mastermind of the insurgency that has gripped the south this year.

Suspects Waeyuso Waeduramae, Muhamad Kanafi Doloh, Abdul Roseh Hayidoloh and Ahama Bula arrived at the court in vans escorted by armed guards, and were pushed through a crush of media crews and police, an AFP photographer said.

"They were remanded for 12 days for further interrogation, and they face six counts including treason and terrorism," a police officer told AFP. The charges carry the death penalty.

Police asked the Bangkok court to refuse bail, saying the four constituted a national security threat.

The government for months has investigated several private Islamic schools in the south, which it accuses of luring young Muslim men and fomenting violence.

Key figures

The four are "key mastermind figures" who had ordered the theft of government firearms and the attacking of officials and innocent civilians, Thai military officials said.
But in what could be seen as a blow to efforts to halt attacks, Thaksin identified a fifth suspect, Islamic school principal Sapae-ing Baso, as the mastermind of the insurgency, but he slipped the dragnet laid out this week in Yala province where the other four were caught.

"From the interrogations it has become clear that he, Sapae-ing, is the leader of the movement," Thaksin said.

The premier said another 100 key figures were being sought, most of whom he described as separatists, but said some of them may have fled the country.

Southern Thailand erupted in violence in January, and to date more than 560 people have been killed in shootings, bombings and other attacks as well as in security crackdowns.

Three people were killed in the south Wednesday, including a Buddhist village chief and a retired teacher. A police corporal was shot dead in Yala on Thursday night.

Schools in Kelantan

Thaksin warned that some of the Islamic militants blamed for the unrest had been trained in neighbouring Malaysia's Kelantan state.

"If you ask me where they have been trained, absolutely one group of them has been trained in Malaysia, but we believe it was done without the knowledge or support of the Malaysian government," Thaksin told reporters.

Earlier this month a Malaysian lawmaker charged that the outlawed Pattani United Liberation Organisation, which is fighting for a separate Islamic state in southern Thailand, had been given RM120,000 by the Kelantan state branch of the Malaysian Islamic Welfare Organisation.

Malaysia says it does not support the separatist movement.

Meanwhile a Thai security source told AFP that Islamic militants were planning major attacks in Bangkok and southern Thai provinces in January to mark the first anniversary of the insurgency.

"According to their plan the large-scale attacks, by means of remote control bombs in five provinces and Bangkok, would be prolonged and severe, as they have stockpiled lots of ammunition," said the security source assigned to work on violence in the south.

Separatist insurgency

He said they would stage attacks in Bangkok to prevent the government from sending additional troops to the south.

The attacks were expected after the new year to mark the anniversary of a brazen Jan 4 raid on a military base in Narathiwat which saw assailants kill four soldiers and steal hundreds of assault rifles.

Militants believed to be linked to the same movement torched about 20 state schools in the south on the same night.

The events rekindled a separatist insurgency that has rumbled for decades in the south, parts of which were an independent kingdom before being annexed by Thailand in 1902.