Thai police say ready to prosecute 2 for Bangkok bombing

However, on Friday, police spokesman Prawut Thornsiri said one of the warrants issued was for “Bilal Mohammed, who is the man in yellow who placed the rucksack at the Erawan shrine“.

“At this point, I think police are heading in the right direction”, Pol Gen Somyot said, adding police are determined to arrest all suspects involved in the bombings.

A man who has been in police custody in Thailand since August 29 has been identified as the primary suspect in a bombing that killed 20 people at Bangkok’s Erawan Shrine last month, Thai police told CNN on Friday (September 25).

Again the links are circumstantial, but the man seen in the images holds a similar looking phone and blue plastic bag in the same hands as those seen carried minutes earlier by the suspected bomber.

Nonetheless, Chuchart Kanpai, the Thai lawyer handling the case on behalf of Karadag, argued that his client might possibly have given untruthful testimony for yet unknown reasons.

The re-enactment came after the two suspects Adem Karadag or Mohammed Bilaturk, and Yusufu Mieraili confessed to the deadly bombing after evidence collected by the police pointed to both of them to be responsible.

The man has become more cooperative with the investigators and has given them more information that was helpful to the probe, the source said. He was arrested at an apartment on the outskirts of Bangkok where police say bomb-making materials and a cache of fake passports were found.

“From evidence police showed him, he accepted the crime”, Prawut said.

The chief suspect is a man in a yellow shirt caught on security camera footage leaving a backpack at the shrine.

So far 17 people have been charged with colluding in committing premeditated murders and attempted murders and colluding in an explosion that caused deaths, police General Sriwara Rangsipramanakul said.

Somyot Poompanmoung blamed the blast on a gang of people-smugglers motivated by revenge for a crackdown on their lucrative trade, including the transfer of Uighurs.

No group has claimed responsibility for the attack or made the motive clear.

Police investigations have focussed on a people-smuggling ring that trafficked Uighur refugees from China to Turkey, using Thailand as a transit point.

Karadag’s lawyer has previously said his client was born in the western Chinese region of Xinjiang, home to around 10 million Uighurs, but moved to Turkey in 2004 where he received Turkish nationality.

Others speculate they may be separatists or Islamist extremists angry that Thailand repatriated more than 100 Uighurs to China in July.