Bangkok's mayor cancels NYE celebrations

Bangkok's Mayor Apirak Kosayothin ordered the cancellation of the two major public New Year's Eve countdown celebrations and other smaller ones following six or more bomb blasts in the city today.

The blasts have killed at least two people and injuring more than 20, officials said. The culprits and motive were unknown.

"Due to several bomb explosions in Bangkok and for the sake of peace and security, I would ask all of you to return to your homes now," Apirak told some 5,000 revellers at the downtown Central World Plaza shopping mall complex. The crowd quickly began to disperse.

Hotels stepped up security, searching cars on their premises. Some fast food outlets closed early.

The major public New Year's Eve celebration in the northern Thailand city of Chiang Mai was also cancelled.

"It is not worth risking," said the provincial police chief in the area, Major General Bandop Sukhonthaman.

The bombings in several parts of city capped a year of unrest in Thailand, including a military coup three months ago and a mounting Muslim insurgency in the south.

National police chief Gen Ajirawit Suphanaphesat said the insurgents were probably not behind today's attacks.

Police and army troops fanned out across Bangkok today to guard entertainment venues and important sites.

Ajirawit said on the iTV television network that at least six blasts occurred, and that authorities were inspecting several more locations where there were suspicious packages.

Police Lt Gen Chongrak Juranond said one person died at Chulalongkorn hospital. Another police officer, Lt Col Teerawit Butsaban, said a second victim succumbed to injuries at another hospital.

A senior health ministry official, Surachet Sathitniramai, said that more than 20 people had been taken to hospital at four Bangkok hospitals.

Ajirawit said six people were injured by a bomb in the slum area of Klong Toey, and four by a bomb near a department store at the city's Victory Monument, which is on a major traffic circle.

He said other blasts occurred near a police post in the Saphan Kwai district, where two were injured, and in Kae Lai district in Nonthaburi, a northern suburb of Bangkok.

"I heard a loud explosion and I thought it was fireworks. I ran there and saw a bleeding woman at the bus stop," said Somrak Manphothong, a receptionist at the Saxophone bar near the Victory Monument.

"Another guy was lying on the floor, covered with blood, and his wife was shaking his body," Somrak said.

At the Klong Toey vegetable market, where one bomb went off, a pool of blood and egg yolks covered the roadside next to an overturned motorcycle.

The police chief said that "the situation remains under control", but warned those out celebrating to exercise caution and to notify police immediately if they find suspicious objects.

Bombings and shootings occur almost daily in Thailand's three southernmost provinces of Yala, Narathiwat and Pattani, where an Islamic insurgency that flared in January 2004 has killed more than 1,900 people.

Muslims make up the majority in overwhelmingly Buddhist Thailand's deep south, where they have long complained of discrimination.

The insurgents are not known to have launched any attacks in Bangkok.