NARATHIWAT: Suspected separatist militants shot and killed five people in two days in Thailand's troubled south, police said Wednesday.

Defence volunteers are villagers trained and armed by security forces to fight the insurgency, which has killed more than 3,700 people in the past five years.

Two other defence volunteers, aged 37 and 26, were shot and killed on Wednesday morning, also in Narathiwat, while a Buddhist man, 52, was shot dead on his way home from a market in Pattani province later that day.

The southern provinces of Narathiwat, Pattani, Yala and parts of Songkhla made up an autonomous Malay Muslim sultanate until it was annexed by mainly Buddhist Thailand in 1902, sparking decades of tension.

Rebels have targeted both Buddhists and Muslims, with victims ranging from security forces to civilians such as teachers and workers on rubber plantations. LINK