YALA, THAILAND - A bomb attack Monday on a crowded market in Thailand's troubled south wounded 24 people including three soldiers, local police said.

The device, hidden in a motorcycle parked in front of the market in Yala town, went off at 7:30 am as customers were shopping for food.

A bitter separatist insurgency in Thailand's Muslim-majority southern provinces has claimed more than 3,900 lives over the past five years. The shadowy militants target Buddhists and Muslims, with victims ranging from teachers and security forces to rubber plantation workers.

The insurgency erupted in January 2004, but tensions have simmered in the region, formerly an autonomous Malay Muslim sultanate, since it was annexed by predominantly Buddhist Thailand in 1902.