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Bangkok / AFP
Two Chinese nationals will go on trial this week for their alleged roles in a deadly bombing at a Bangkok shrine one year ago, an attack whose motive remains clouded in mystery following a murky and at times surreal investigation.
The trial, which starts on Tuesday, is being held at a military court in Bangkok and is expected to last more than a year.
The bombing was the worst assault of its kind in Thailand’s recent history.
But one year later more than a dozen key suspects named during the investigation remain at large, while analysts say Thai authorities have yet to offer a convincing motive.
The small but powerful bomb packed with ball bearings killed 20 people and wounded more than 100 when it ripped through Erawan shrine in the heart of Bangkok’s shopping district on August 17, 2015.
The Hindu shrine is popular among ethnic Chinese visitors, who made up a majority of the dead with five from Malaysia, five from China and two from Hong Kong. Two members of China’s Muslim minority Uighur population—Yusufu Mieraili and Bilal Mohammed—have been charged with involvement.
Analysts have largely coalesced around the theory that the bombing was in revenge for the Thai junta’s forcible return of 109 Uighurs to China weeks earlier. But Thai authorities have said the two incidents are unrelated and insist the bombing was carried out by a people smuggling gang angered by recent policing successes against human trafficking.
The Uighur minority say they face cultural and religious repression in their homeland of Xinjiang in northwest China, and many are believed to have fled the restive region in recent years.
The junta’s deportations sparked international condemnation and violent protests outside Thailand’s diplomatic missions in Turkey, which has given refuge to many of the Turkic-speaking group.
Throughout the investigation Thai police and military officials sent out conflicting and at times contradictory messages.
Junta officials initially pointed the finger at domestic critics of their rule.
Then after investigators arrested the two Uighur suspects, they refused to confirm their Chinese nationality for more than a week.