In the battle between jihad and origami, bet on jihad: Origami peace gesture met with violence in Thailand. (Hat tip: Baikal.)

A creative peace offering has been met with renewed violence in the troubled south of Thailand.

Hours after 50 Thai army planes dropped some 100 million Japanese-style origami cranes over the predominantly Muslim region Sunday, suspected Muslim militants shot dead a former prosecutor in Pattani province, reports The BBC.

On Monday morning four Thai troops were wounded when a bomb was detonated remotely by a mobile phone at a rest-stop for patrolling soldiers in Narathiwat province, reports The Associated Press. Hours later, writes AP, another bomb exploded nearby seriously injuring an assistant district chief as he parked his car.

BBC reports that the paper bird drop was arranged to coincide with the 77th birthday of Thailand’s king.

…ordinary Thais across the country wrote messages on paper birds they had folded.

As the birds fell to their targets in the provinces of Narathiwat, Yala, and Pattani, school children rushed out to collect them and seek the notes inside. Some students constructed giant nets stretched across school yards to capture the paper cranes.

One bird folded and signed by Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra offered a scholarship if found by a child, or a job for an adult. The cranes could also be exchanged for food as The Bangkok Post reports.

Twenty cranes can be exchanged for one egg, 50 cranes for 1kg of sugar or rice. All cranes collected would be given to authorities who will boil them and mix with lime to build a monument to peace.

Thaksin said the effort had achieved an “enormous, positive psychological effect” toward peace, reports AP.