NARATHIWAT (Thailand) - SEPARATIST militants shot dead two Muslim men and injured a soldier in a bomb attack in Thailand's troubled south, police said on Wednesday.

The violence came as the Thai government renewed emergency rule over the southern provinces of Narathiwat, Pattani, Yala and parts of Songkhla, where more than 3,700 people have died in a five-year insurgency.

A 45-year-old Muslim villager was killed in a drive-by shooting in Pattani on Tuesday evening, police said.

A Muslim security volunteer, also 45, was killed in a separate drive-by shooting in the same province early on Wednesday, as he took his wife to work by motorcycle.

In Narathiwat there were two roadside bomb attacks early on Wednesday, targeting security teams providing protection for teachers. One of them injured a 22-year-old Thai soldier, police said.

The southern region was an autonomous Malay Muslim sultanate until it was annexed by Thailand in 1902, sparking decades of tension.

Islamic rebels have targeted both Buddhists and Muslims, with victims ranging from security forces to civilians such as teachers and rubber plantation workers. -- AFP