Experts are warning the government against rushing to expand the scope of the Internal Security Act (ISA), saying hard lessons still need to be learned from the use of draconian special laws in the far South.
Civil society activists should also have a greater say in the government's approach to security laws in the region, speakers at a recent seminar on the decade-long conflict said.
The Internal Security Operations Command (Isoc) is considering expanding the scope of the ISA before the emergency decree expires in mid-April.
Authorities are especially interested in testing the effectiveness of Section 21 of the ISA, under which suspected insurgents could escape prosecution if they surrender and agree to cooperate with authorities.
Somchai Homlaor, a member of the Law Reform Committee, said the use of special laws over the past decade had only bred further violence.
He pointed to records showing that 70 DNA samples taken from people involved in the southern violence since 2004 matched samples collected from protesters at the Tak Bai incident.
About 3,000 people gathered on Oct 25, 2004, in front of the Tak Bai police station in Narathiwat to demand the release of six volunteer village guards. The military moved in to break up the protests, rounding up the protesters and transporting them to military camps.
Overcrowding in the transport lorries killed 85 people, triggering a surge in separatist violence.
"This reminds me of similar consequences after the October 1976 massacre inside Thammasat University. Most students and intellectuals had no other choice but to join the guerrilla warfare campaign against the state with the former Communist Party," Mr Somchai said.
The situation in the South is worse, with more violent incidents, he said.
Martial law and the emergency decree were key factors fuelling the violence, but the mindset of security forces was just as much of an impediment to peace, he said. The government needs to open more common political space for all, even if some of the participants are known insurgents. In replacing the current special laws with the ISA, the government should ask itself how sincere its intentions are, and how practical its implementation will be.
Isoc officials believe the use of Section 21 might produce results similar to those of the amnesty programme that led the Communist Party to end its campaign against the state three decades ago.
Sunai Phasuk, the Human Rights Watch representative in Thailand, said a key militant killed on Feb 13 during the failed insurgent raid on a military outpost in Narathiwat's Bacho district was one of the Tak Bai protesters. That showed people were still angry with the military.
Punishments handed out to officers had not been well-publicised, so people were not aware that authorities had also been reprimanded. Anger and a desire for revenge are still widespread.
Of the 5,000 deaths over the past 10 years, only about 300 had been soldiers or other government figures, he said.