(Recasts with updated death toll) YALA, Thailand, May 5 (Reuters) - Six Thais, including three children, were killed in the latest gun and bomb attacks in the country's restive Muslim deep south, police said on Saturday. A 2-year-old girl and two policemen were killed by a roadside bomb in the province of Yala, one of three mainly Malay-speaking southern provinces roiled by a three-year separatist insurgency. The blast, which occurred on Saturday evening as the officers rode past on their motorcycle, also badly wounded a teenage boy, police said. On Friday, unknown gunmen shot dead a 46-year-old Thai Muslim man and his son and daughter -- aged 7 and 11 -- as they returned home from prayers in another part of Yala. The attacks came as hundreds of Muslims held a fifth day of protests in Yala demanding the release of 20 people who police said were insurgents. Hundreds of Buddhist villagers staged counter protests in another part of the province, opposing the release of the detainees, police said. Separately, two schools in Yala were burnt down on Friday, the latest to be targeted in a wave of attacks on schools and teachers seen as symbols of the government in faraway Bangkok. More than 2,100 people have been killed over the past three years in the conflict in the former sultanate annexed by largely Buddhist Thailand a century ago. Thailand's military-backed government said last week it planned to offer an amnesty to people suspected of being involved in the insurgency. Prime Minister Surayud Chulanont has shunned the hardline policies of his predecessor, Thaksin Shinawatra, who was ousted in a bloodless coup in September last year. Surayud's conciliatory strategy has included an apology for abuses by security forces in the mainly Malay-speaking region. He also has pushed for dialogue and greater recognition of Malay culture and language. But the gun and bomb attacks on both Muslims and Buddhists have intensified despite 30,000 soldiers and paramilitary rangers in the region bordering Malaysia.
