Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Razak and his Thai counterpart PrayuthChan-ocha agreed to foster the progress of peace talks in the southernregion of Thailand along the two countries’ shared border.
During a one-day visit by the Thai Prime Minister on December 1, the twosides agreed on three basic principles to bring an end to thedecades-long violence in Thailand’s Muslim-majority southern provinces.
The principles include a period free of violence; therepresentation of all parties in the peace talks; and all partiesagreeing to a list of demands to be put to the Thai government.
The Thai PM affirmed Malaysia’s role as the only mediator in the peace talks.
In 2013, Malaysia hosted the peace talks between Muslim rebels and theprevious civilian government of former Prime Minister YingluckShinawatra.
However, those talks made little headway and eventually collapsed due to political crisis in Thailand.
More than 6,000 people have been killed and other 10,600 woundedduring the current decades-long violence, according to the Thai Army’sstatistics.-VNA