The Thai army commander who ordered an assault on a mosque which killed 32 Muslim militants in the country's south in April has resigned over the controversial raid, Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra said.
General Pallop Pinmanee stood down in the wake of a damning report which determined that forces under his command used excessive force when they raided the historic mosque in Pattani province on April 28.
He left his post Wednesday as deputy chief of the Southern Border Provinces Peace-building Command but reportedly will continue to serve in internal security capacities.
"You must understand that soldiers will be responsible for what they have done," Thaksin told reporters Thursday.
"Pallop is a real soldier. When others complained that his actions were not right he showed responsibility by resigning in good spirits."
The premier stopped short of acknowledging any wrongdoing by Pallop, however, and took a defensive stance against the report by a government-appointed commission investigating the mosque massacre.
"The report did not blame soldiers. It concluded that excessive force should not have been used on that day, but it is understandable that there was a lot of pressure on that day," Thaksin said.
"There were soldiers killed and weapons stolen, and there was concern there might be more (militants) to come to try and rescue the militants holed up in the mosque."
The fact-finding commission concluded that troops were too heavy-handed when they stormed the Krue Se mosque on a day when 108 militants and five security forces were killed in southern Thailand.
Soldiers used grenades and heavy weaponry against the lightly-armed militants who fled to the mosque after attacking a checkpoint, according to a four-page summary of the report released Tuesday.
But the inquiry team said the crisis could have ended peacefully and called on the government to compensate victims from both sides, a finding that the government has accepted.
The tough-talking Pallop defended his leadership in the attack and slammed the commission members, comprising a former constitutional judge and several Muslim scholars, as "civilians who know nothing about the strategy of soldiers," the Nation newspaper reported.
He also reportedly rejected the policy of compensating families of the victims and accused the government of making too many concessions.
"Is the government going to wrap Thai flags on the corpses of these bandits if the community asks for it?" he said in the English-language daily.
Human rights activists had demanded Wednesday that Pallop be held accountable for the massacre.
The Asian Human Rights Commission demanded a full judicial inquiry into the killings after the government indicated that the officers in charge of the assault would not be punished.