BANGKOK, Jun 15 (IPS) - The soldiers assigned to provide security for students and teachers at a school in the violence-torn southern province of Yala on Friday were part of a new plan by the military-appointed government in Bangkok. But they never made it.

A roadside bomb detonated near the military vehicle before the soldiers got to the school, resulting in the death of seven troopers. The perpetrators also opened fire on the soldiers, according to news reports.

This strike, which the local police blamed on Malay-Muslim insurgents, brought home the increasingly difficult task the Thai military is facing in protecting schools in the southern provinces of Narathiwat, Yala and Pattani, which lie close to the Thai-Malaysian border.

In Pattani, a few days earlier, a bomb went off outside a public school, killing one soldier and injuring another. That happened around the time two female teachers were shot to death in front of their students at a primary school in Narathiwat. This week also saw insurgents torch 11 schools in Yala.

The roadside explosions, part of an increasingly vicious separatist conflict, also point to the growing accuracy with which the militants are striking their targets. On May 31, Thai troops were hit by a roadside bomb in Yala that killed 12 soldiers, making it the most deadly attack on government forces since the eruption of violence in January 2004. Early May saw a similar strike when a roadside bomb killed seven Special Forces men in Narathiwat province.

‘'The militants are learning; they are getting better as long as this conflict goes on,'' Zachary Abuza, a United States academic who has written extensively on terrorism in South-east Asia, told IPS. ‘'Earlier they had a few bomb makers, but now there is a proliferation.''

This conflict, which has seen the death toll cross 2,200 over the past three-and-a-half years, has other grim tallies. This month saw the 30th person beheaded by the insurgents. The victim was Surachai Nalumalinee, 36, whose head was found 10 m away from his body, according to the police. He was among four people who lost their lives near a village in Narathiwat.

This clash, which pits an estimated 30,000 Thai troops in the south against militants whose strength and proper identity remain unknown, is also showing signs common in other insurgencies across the world. Of concern to human rights groups monitoring the area are the ‘tit-for-tat' killings.

‘'The local people have now come to expect retaliatory strikes from government troops dressed in civilian clothes -- or vigilantes -- after each militant attack,'' says one human rights activist who spoke over the phone from Yala on condition of anonymity. ‘'They have many examples. They point to the shooting of ustadz (Muslim religious teachers).''

The Jun. 12 murder of Abdul Raman Sama, a 60-year-old religious teacher, well respected in his community, is a case in point. It led to some 500 Muslim women and children demonstrating in front of a mosque to protest the killings. The locals, according to sources IPS spoke with, blame Thai troops for the killing.

In fact, the targeting of state schools by attackers has come to symbolise the most disturbing trend that shows little sign of abating. Its continuation, furthermore, is proving to be deeply embarrassing to the government of Prime Minister Surayud Chulanont, a former army chief, who was named to lead the government following a military coup in September last year.

‘'A new surge of violent attacks on teachers and schools by separatist militants has seriously disrupted education in Thailand's southern border provinces,'' Human Rights Watch (HRW), the global rights lobby, said in a statement released Thursday. ‘'Officials in Narathiwat province have been forced to close more than 300 government schools in all 13 districts this week after insurgents killed three teachers on Jun. 11.''

‘'Insurgents are terrorising teachers and students, which they consider symbols of the Thai state,'' said Brad Adams, Asia director at HRW. ‘'These attacks are grave crimes and cannot be justified by any cause.''

According to available reports, over 75 teachers have been killed, while over 70 have been injured or made disabled for life due to attacks by the militants since early 2004. The number of schools that have been torched or attacked during this period is nearing 200.

Growing anger in Bangkok towards the attack on schools was reflected Friday in a hard-hitting editorial that appeared in ‘The Nation,' an English language daily. ‘'The military has a very high opinion of itself that is not matched by its performance as a fighting force,'' it said in the commentary, titled ‘Close schools until army performs'. ‘'Insurgents have succeeded in everything that they have set out to do, while the military has failed to achieve any of what the public expects.''

‘'How many more teachers have to be killed in cold blood in schools or on their way to and from work in remote communities infested with insurgents before the military comes to its senses and starts defending civilians?'' it asked. ‘'Schools in areas infiltrated with insurgents must be closed down for the whole semester, if necessary, and should not be opened until the military is able to secure them and guarantee the safety of the teachers, children and the local population.''

The Surayud administration received early notice about what the militants had in mind regarding the schools in the south. Barely weeks after Surayud launched a peace offensive in the area, including an unequivocal apology to the Malay-Muslims residents for part atrocities by the state, the militants struck. They killed five teachers and burnt down 12 schools. These acts of terror spread fear by the end of November, resulting in an unprecedented 1,000 schools in the three provinces closing down before the term ended.

The three provinces are home to this Buddhist country's largest minority -- the Malay-Muslims. The area was part of the Muslim kingdom of Pattani till it was annexed in 1902 by Siam, as Thailand was then known. The Malay-Muslims have complained about cultural and economic discrimination for decades.

Malay-Muslim animosity to Bangkok's policies emerged in the 1950s, after the Thai government forced the southerners to sacrifice some of their religious and cultural identity for a predominantly Thai-Buddhist one, including the pressure to take on Thai names.

A Malay-Muslim rebel movement that emerged in response to such policies in the late 1960s struck back to wage a separatist campaign. State-run schools became early targets, since these institutions were viewed by the militants as being tools for Bangkok's assimilation policies.