A military court in Thailand today charged two men accused of carrying out a deadly explosion in central Bangkok in August.

The bomb attack at the Erawan shrine killed 20 people, mostly tourists, and injured more than 120.

Adem Karadag and Yusufu Mieraili each face 10 charges, including premeditated murder, but not terrorism, Thai media reported.

The two suspects arrived at the military court in Bangkok this morning in handcuffs and escorted by the police.

Neither defendant entered a plea during the hearing, the reports said.

Karadag, identified initially by the name Bilal Muhammed, and Mieraili have been detained at an army base since they were arrested in August and September, respectively.

Karadag, 28, was carrying a fake Turkish passport, and told his lawyer in September that he was an ethnic Uighur from western China.

Mieraili is 25 and was carrying a passport saying he was from the Xinjiang region of China, where most Uighurs live.

Thai officials have said that a people-smuggling network was behind the attack, which they say was in retaliation for a crackdown on the trafficking of Uighurs.

The network was said to have used Thailand as a transit point between China and Turkey.

Earlier in the investigation, Thai police said they believed the mastermind behind the operation had fled Thailand and was still at large.

- dpa