The spin from South East Asian politicians continued this week when Malaysian PM Mahathir earlier this week stated that Malaysia was safe as all individuals with suspected links to terrorism had either already been detained or were under close surveillance. It's quite a boast. Still I don't expect that a government that bans it's air quality ratings from publication as it may reflect badly on Malaysia's tourism image overseas cannot be expected to be a paragon of virtue nor intelligence.

Meanwhile, back in the Thailand The Nation today reports that tourist security has been boosted in popular tourist destinations. It's not a moment too soon and contrasts with Thaksin's own arrogant and either calculating or naive boast last week that Thailand was not a target for terrorists.

The effort of South East Asian politicians to dump all the bad PR on Indonesia has been noticeable. The fact is that the Bali bombings serve notice that international terrorists have expanded their battlefield front from Western symbols of power, capitalism and wealth on their own territory to any place where Westerners gather, - expatriate or tourist. For years we have known that terrorism knows no boundaries and respects no religion nor humanity. The South East Asian semi-autonomous business unit of the international terrorist network has its own sub agenda - to turn South East Asia as a whole into an Islamic state. Mahathir himself knows they have targeted those countries with majority Muslim populations for the first battles - certainly Indonesia and Malaysia.

Yet Buddhist Thailand is not immune with a long history of separatist activity in the South. In the South East Asian field of operations, the real target is not Australians, nor even foreigners or infidels. As gut-wrenching as it is, they are but means to an end. The real target is the non-Islamic and moderate Islamic political power élite that have established themselves by working together with the global economy in a territory that terrorists believe they own as a right.

Phuket, located in the far south of Thailand has a far greater proportion of Muslim population than Thailand as a whole. There is absolutely no reason why Phuket, with its dependence on foreign tourism and it's own centres of decadence akin to Kuta, should not be on the same agenda of a group that wants to wrest political control of South East Asia. Their cause is impossible, but they can cause a lot of pain to innocents along the way to this realization. Reports from travel agents in places like Scandanavia that outbound tourists are cancelling Bali holidays for Phuket holidays should not be a reason for celebration in Thailand, but a dark warning, for the moving targets may have just moved to Thailand.

This is no time for spin or blaming, but a time for all those who live in, work in, travel to and love South East Asia to unite in our defence. Honesty helps. Apart from extending the fight to break the terror network, perhaps the first modest action would be an international effort to finance and support Bali in recovering their tourism industry as soon as possible. A creative monument that will attract freedom-loving people worldwide, and dedicated to those who lost their lives and our defiance to the instruments of terror on the island of Bali may be a suitable place to start.