Narathiwat highway police seized 40 pipe bombs together with several timers and other equipment in a pickup truck at a checkpoint on Sungai Kolok-Takbai highway in the southern province of Narathiwat on Thursday afternoon.
One suspect, identified later as Sanusee Yatae, 36, was arrested in the vehicle while another, identified by police as Abdul-arsi Sama, managed to escape police pursuit.
Highway police set up a checkpoint on the highway to check passing vehicles. At about noon, a bronze gold Isuzu pickup truck approached the checkpoint and was stopped for a search.
The police unfolded two quilts in the passengers’ cabin and found several bombs. Then they alerted officials from the explosives ordnance disposal unit to examine the bombs.
Besides the 40 pipe bombs, there were two radio transmitters, four torches, two boxes of radio circuitry, 36 boxes of timer circuits set for five minutes, one box of timer circuits set for ten minutes, two boxes of time circuits set for 30 minutes and one steel pipe bomb.