BANGKOK, Dec. 17 (Xinhuanet) -- Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra Friday announced the issue of arrest warrants for 12 suspected leaders of the insurgency in the deep South.

    The situation will certainly improve if all the key mastermindsbehind the violence are captured, Thaksin was quoted by the Thai News Agency as saying.

    While some of the insurgent leaders may have fled to Malaysia, most of them are still hiding in Thailand, the prime minister said.

    The police are now tracking down Sapaeing Basor, a principal ofthe Dhammawittaya School which is a private Muslim secondary school with some 7,000 students.

    Sapaeing is the leader of the Barison Revolusi Nasional (BRN), an insurgent group active in the south, Thaksin said.

    Other four arrested suspected masterminds behind the violence told police interrogators on Thursday that Sapaeing would become the prime minister if the militant group wins the struggle in the South and forms its own government and administration, Thaksin said.

    The police are also hunting around a hundred key members of theinsurgent group.

    Some of these militants were trained in Thailand and others underwent training in Malaysia, he said. The Malaysian government was unaware of these activities as they were conducted in the jungles of the Kelantan state, he added.

    The detained suspected masterminds were sent to the Bangkok Criminal Court for arraignment. They were interrogated by officials at the military camp in the southern province of Pattanion Thursday, the report said. Enditem