Four Buddhists shot dead in unrest. (Hat tip: aussiemagpie.)

SUSPECTED Islamic militants today shot dead four Buddhists in two separate attacks in Thailand’s mainly Muslim south, where an insurgency has raged for more than two years, police said.

In one attack, two teenagers in Islamic students’ dress and riding a motorcycle, shot and killed three Buddhists in Yala, the capital of a province of the same name.

“The militants exploited the fact that the men were shopping at a grocery store and could not defend themselves, even though they had a gun,” police Colonel Somsak Wannawak said.

Earlier a militant shot dead a Buddhist man in Pattani province while he was riding a bus, police said.

More than 1400 people have died in the conflict in Thailand’s far south since early 2004. The violence has been blamed on Malay separatism, religious extremism and organised crime in the border region.