BANGKOK (AP) – A foreign suspect arrested at the border near Cambodia is unlikely to be the yell0w-shirted man who planted the bomb at a Bangkok shrine nearly three weeks ago, police said Friday.
The definitive ruling out of the suspect – identified as Mieraili Yusufu or Yusufu Meerailee – implies that the person who bombed the Erawan Shrine in Bangkok on Aug. 17 remains at large despite two arrests and naming of seven other suspects in recent days.
The evening blast at the shrine popular among locals and tourists alike left 20 people dead and more than 120 injured in one of the most devastating acts of violence that the Thai capital had seen in decades.
Thai authorities have suggested that at least two of the suspects are possibly Turkish, boosting a theory that the bombing was to avenge Thailand’s forced repatriation of more than 100 ethnic Uighurs to China in July. Uighurs (pronounced WEE-gurs) are related to Turks, and Turkey is home to a large Uighur community.
National police spokesman Prawut Thavornsiri said DNA samples taken from the suspect did not match the DNA found on evidence that the bomber is believed to have left behind in a taxi, a banknote and a motorcycle taxi he took after leaving the pipe bomb under a bench at the open-air the shrine when it was packed with worshippers.