PAS Youth leaders today lambasted a Thai intelligence report which has accused the party of fuelling the recent violence in Thailand's deep south as part of the Islamic party's strategy to further its political grip after suffering political setbacks at home.

PAS Youth wing chief Salahuddin Ayub said the intelligence report, highlighted by Thai newspaper The Nation yesterday, was untrue and claimed that it was part of '... the global conspiracy to paint a bad picture of Islam.

"PAS do not condone any kind of violence. We have never supported groups that promote violence and to claim that we are fuelling the violence in southern Thailand to extend our political influence is false and ludicrous," he told malaysiakini when contacted.

The intelligence report - which was leaked to the Thai media by government officials - claimed that PAS was linked to the recent sectarian violence in southern Thailand including the Tak Bai tragedy last month. Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra was said to have been given a copy of the report.

The intelligence officer who authored the report claimed to have based his findings on a PAS-organised seminar in Kuala Lumpur last week attended by Salahuddin, his deputy Idris Ahmad and Federal Territory PAS Youth chief Riduan Mohd Noor.

The author, however, did not elaborate on how he came to the conclusion that PAS had instigated the violence in southern Thailand or the party went about it.

'Prove it'

Salahuddin denied attending any seminar related to the problems faced by southern Thailand Muslims.

"Apart from the demonstration at the Thai Embassy here, I have never attended any seminar related to southern Thailand either before or after the Tak Bai tragedy. Neither has PAS organised any seminar linked to the tragedy," he said.

"If they dare point their finger at us, then I dare them to prove the truth of the report and the allegations contained within it."

Salahuddin added he would first study Thai media reports on the purported intelligence article before lodging an official protest.

Idris, who was apparently quoted in the report as 'a PAS leader from Terengganu' also expressed his surprise as to how the report could have come to its conclusion when the PAS seminar it mentioned never took place.

"I don't think any of us named in the report had ever attended any seminar on southern Thailand. No such seminar was ever organised by PAS in or outside Malaysia," he said.

He said he strongly believed that the allegations were created as an attempt to link PAS with terrorist acts.

Ceramah held

Ridhuan, when contacted, denied that he was 'head of PAS' external relations in Pattani' as claimed in the Thai intelligence report.

"First of all there was no seminar like the one mentioned. But the youth wing did hold a ceramah (public talk) on Oct 31 in Kuala Lumpur where Salahuddin, as the secretary of Amsec (Asean Muslim Youth Secretariat) was invited to speak," he explained.

"If that intelligence report's conclusion was made based on this ceramah , then it is baseless. The speakers only touched on the historical aspects of the Pattani Muslims and their continued woes there.

"The ceramah was also held to launch a humanitarian fund to help the 85 Muslims who died at Tak Bai," he revealed.

He said that there was nothing unusual about the holding of the ceramah as PAS had organised similar events to help the Muslim communities in Iraq, Kosovo, Afghanistan and Cambodia.

Ridhuan said that the Thai intelligence report would not deter PAS from continuing to highlight the '... victimisation faced by Muslims in southern Thailand'.

"If they think that the report is going to stop us then they are mistaken. We cannot remain silent when Muslims there continue to suffer," he said.

He said he believed that the Thai government was trying to put the blame on others to avoid being held responsible for the deaths of hundreds of southern Thai Muslims.

"There are trying to find a scapegoat. They want to blame other people except themselves," he said, adding that this was in keeping with the alarming trend of blaming violence on Islam-based organisations and political parties.

Mounting violence

The Tak Bai tragedy on Oct 26 in which 85 Thai Muslim protestors died of suffocation after they were indiscriminately heaped onto army trucks has drawn international condemnation and outrage.

The Thai military had loaded the detained protestors onto the trucks up to six deep for transport to a military prison following a demonstration outside a police station in the Muslim-dominated Narathiwat province.

The province shares a common border with the Malaysian northeast state of Kelantan, which is ruled by the opposition PAS.

The Tak Bai incident was the worst violence seen in southern Thailand since April 28 when Thai troops stormed the ancient Krue Se mosque in Pattani, killing more than 100 alleged Muslim insurgents who had taken refuge there.

Muslim leaders, organisations and governments have since urged Thai premier Thaksin to resolve the problems as soon as possible to avoid more deaths.