When democracy truly comes to Burma, new challenges will arise which will be as difficult to overcome as the current ones. There will be no panacea. Post-apartheid South Africa, independent East Timor, a democratic Maldives, not to mention the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe show that a transition to freedom and democracy is not easy. A free Burma will need continued international support and solidarity. Resolving conflicts within ethnic groups, between the ethnic nationalities and the majority population, between different Burman factions and between the population and the military will require time and expertise. Questions of how to balance the apparently conflicting principles of justice and reconciliation will dominate, as they did in South Africa and East Timor. Developing skills and infrastructure will need international resources. There may be further conflict, tension and turmoil even when Burma has won its freedom, if the experiences of the Maldives and East Timor are anything to go by. In the Maldives, a coup d’état in 2012 by forces close to the previous dictator, in collusion with Islamists, in which Mohamed Nasheed was forced to resign at gunpoint, set back democratisation. In East Timor in 2008, tension between the government and rebels within the army threatened the country’s new-found fragile independence, led to violence and the displacement of thousands, and assassination attempts on José Ramos-Horta and Xanana Gusmão. Building an open society after decades of repression is not easy, as these examples show.
Developing the building blocks of democracy – the rule of law, respect for basic freedoms and human rights, the conduct of multi-party and multi-ethnic politics – will pose further challenges as well as opportunities. Yet if the peoples of Burma can agree on a plan for genuine federal democracy, and embrace the principle of unity in diversity, then these hurdles can be overcome and Burma can be the thriving, beautiful, successful land it deserves to be. The rising awareness of the centrality of the ethnic question among some prominent Burman dissidents encourages me to believe that the challenges are not insurmountable. The ’88 Generation leaders have started to show a level of understanding and concern about the ethnic situation that had not previously been seen, as has Ludu Sein Win. ‘I fully support the ethnic people,’ he told me in January 2012. ‘They are fighting for their freedom. As a Burman, I hate the Burman mentality of seeing ourselves as the “elder brother”, and the ethnic people as “younger brother”. Who gave the Burmans “elder brother” status? All the peoples of Burma should have equality, secured by federalism.’
In February 2012, Aung San Suu Kyi visited Kachin State and delivered a speech in which she promised to work for the establishment of a genuine federal union. This pledge should go some way towards reassuring the ethnic people, some of whom have questioned her commitment to addressing their plight. Most ethnic people, however, recognise that Aung San Suu Kyi is their best hope for a resolution. ‘We understand that she is struggling for the people of Burma, and we appreciate what she is doing,’ one Kachin told me just a month before she visited the state. ‘We request her to think about the Kachin people, who have suffered a long time. We are left far behind the other people of Burma. We hope she will consider protecting the Kachin people. We trust her, and that is why we ask for her help to protect our people and our rights.’ A Kachin pastor emphasised her responsibility as the daughter of Aung San, whose legacy included the Panglong Agreement. ‘We Kachin people have really high regard for her father’s legacy. We hope it will be fulfilled one day.’
The choice Burma faces is illustrated perhaps most colourfully by the story of one of the NLD’s by-election candidates, Zayar Thaw, founder of the Generation Wave movement of activists established in 2007. Zayar Thaw was a hip-hop singer, but in April 2012 he contested, and surprisingly won, one of the parliamentary seats in the regime’s stronghold of Naypyidaw. The juxtaposition of contrasts – hip-hop singer in his thirties takes on ex-Generals in their sixties – represents the choice Burma must make between its future and its past. So too does Zayar Thaw’s vision. When I met him in January 2012, he talked about the need to unite the country, to end the brutal persecution of ethnic minorities, to guarantee equal rights for all, to develop understanding between the Burmans and the ethnic groups, and to help people understand the real meaning of federalism and its benefits for the country. He also talked about his own experience of three years in prison, and his desire for reconciliation with his adversaries. ‘We don’t want to live with hate, we want to look forward. If our hearts are filled with hate, we cannot do anything else,’ he said. ‘The system made us – whether we are activists against the system, or officials within the system. In our struggle, we, the activists, are trying to push the system, and the people within it are trying to protect the system. But if together we change the system, then the problem is solved.’ This desire to look to the future was reiterated to me by Aung San Suu Kyi. ‘There are some people who think it is still 1988,’ she said. ‘It isn’t. It is right to be sceptical or cautious, but to not want to try – that I don’t understand.’
In their struggle for freedom, as they approach the crossroads of potential change, the people of Burma deserve the continued support of the international community. The vision is clear, as Aung San Suu Kyi has articulated it: ‘We want a Burma where there’s freedom to debate, and to exchange ideas, and to analyse the situation as we see it. Burma is now at an important juncture in its modern history. We have come to a path where we may be able to progress towards our long-cherished goal of democracy and freedom,’ she told Chatham House in 2011.6 As Burma approaches this crossroads, the time has come to redouble our efforts, individually and collectively. A banner hanging in a bamboo hut in a Karen village of internally displaced people, orphaned, widowed, wounded and dying of treatable and preventable diseases, presents a challenge for us all. On the banner was the question: ‘Are you for democracy or dictatorship?’ We all need to consider our response, and what that means in terms of action.
Notes
Author’s Note
1 Hugh C. MacDougall, ‘Burma Press Summary No. 27’, May 1989, citing SLORC Information Minister coverage in Working People’s Daily newspaper
Introduction
1 Bertil Lintner, ‘The Staying Power of the Burmese Military Regime’, paper presented at a public forum on Burma at Aichi Gakuin University, Nagoya, Japan, 11–17 March, 2009
2 Chin Human Rights Group, ‘Critical Point: Food Scarcity and Hunger in Burma’s Chin State’, 2008
3 Christina Fink, Living Silence in Burma: Surviving Under Military Rule, second edition, Zed Books and Silkworm Books, 2009, 3
Chapter 1: From Rice Bowl to Basket Case
1 Fink, 18
2 Kin Oung, Who Killed Aung San?, White Lotus, 1996, 17
3 Ibid., 74
4 Aung San Suu Kyi, ‘Aung San’, Asiaweek, 12 June 1998
5 Burma Centre for Ethnic Studies, Peace and Reconciliation, Analysis Paper No. 2, ‘The Challenges of Ethnic Politics and Negotiated Settlement: From Ceasefire to Political Dialogue’, February 2012
6 Ashley South, Ethnic Politics in Burma: States of Conflict, Routledge, 2008
7 Ibid., 24
8 Thant Myint-U, The River of Lost Footsteps: A Personal History of Burma, Faber and Faber, 2008, 209
9 Ibid., 209
10 South, 21
11 Field Marshal Viscount Slim, Defeat Into Victory: Battling Japan in Burma and India, 1942–1945, Cooper Square Press, 2000, 519
12 Ibid., 485
13 Martin Smith, Burma: Insurgency and the Politics of Ethnicity, Zed Books, 1999, 65
14 Paul Gore-Booth, With Great Truth and Respect: The Memoirs of Paul Gore-Booth, Constable, 1974, 212
15 Ibid., 30
16 Kin Oung, 40
17 Ibid., 67
18 Smith, 305
19 As quoted in Kin Oung, 31
20 Ibid., 69
21 Ibid., 71
22 Fink, 22
23 Gore-Booth, 223
24 Fink, 23
25 Ibid., 23
26 Gor
e-Booth, 223
27 Thant Myint-U, 290
28 International Crisis Group, ‘Myanmar: A New Peace Initiative’, Asia Report No. 214, 30 November 2011
29 Inge Sargent, Twilight over Burma: My Life as a Shan Princess, University of Hawaii Press, 1994, xxiii
30 Gore-Booth, 220
31 Ibid., 224
32 Ibid., 224
33 Ibid., 26
34 Thant Myint-U, 292
35 Ibid., 293
36 Smith, 1
37 Fink, 32
38 Thant Myint-U, 311
39 Ibid., 312
40 Ibid., 312
41 Fink, 40
Chapter 2: Cry Freedom
1 Ibid., 47
2 Bertil Lintner, Outrage: Burma’s Struggle for Democracy, Review Publishing Company, 1989, 16
3 Smith, 2
4 Asiaweek, ‘Burma: A Raging Discontent’, 8 July 1988
5 Fink, 49
6 ‘Bogyoke’ means ‘General’, and is typically used in reference to both Aung San and Ne Win.
7 Asiaweek, ‘Burma: A Raging Discontent’, 8 July 1988
8 Ibid.
9 Ibid.
10 Lintner, 117–19
11 Ibid., 119
12 Asiaweek, ‘Burma: Revolt in the Streets’, 19 August 1988
13 Ibid., 135
14 Ibid., 144
15 Ibid., 154
16 Ibid., 156
17 Aung San Suu Kyi, Freedom from Fear, Penguin Books, 1991, Introduction by Michael Aris, xvii
18 Aung San Suu Kyi, ‘Belief in Burma’s Future’, Independent, 12 September 1988
19 Aung San Suu Kyi, Freedom from Fear, xix
20 Lintner, 157
21 Aung San Suu Kyi, Freedom from Fear, 193
22 Ibid., 195
23 Lintner, 159
24 Fink, 55
25 Ibid., 55
26 Lintner, 166
27 Ibid., 167
28 Ibid., 171
29 Ibid., 181
30 Ibid., 184
31 Asiaweek, ‘Interview with Aung San Suu Kyi: “I am the Target”’, 21 July 1989
32 Lintner, ‘The Rise and Fall of the Communist Party of Burma’, Cornell South-East Asia Program, 1990, 1
33 Ibid., 49
34 Fink, 63
35 Lintner, ‘The Rise and Fall of the Communist Party of Burma’, 50
36 Asiaweek, ‘Interview with Aung Gyi: “I Trust the Army”’, 21 July 1989
37 Asiaweek, ‘Interview with Min Ko Naing: “Fighting a ‘Bad King’”’, 28 December 1988
38 Aung San Suu Kyi, ‘Belief in Burma’s Future’, Independent, 12 September 1988
39 Asiaweek, Interview with Saw Maung: ‘I Saved Burma’, 27 January 1989
40 Ibid.
41 Asiaweek, ‘Burma: Debating the Polls Promise’, 21 October 1988
42 Aung San Suu Kyi, The Voice of Hope: Conversations with Alan Clements, Rider, 2008, 52
43 Dominic Faulder, ‘The Burmese Way to Steal an Election’, The Asian Wall Street Journal, 7 May 1990
44 Lintner, Aung San Suu Kyi and Burma’s Unfinished Renaissance, Peacock Press, 1990, 28
45 Maung Aung Myoe, A Historical Overview of Political Transition in Myanmar since 1988, Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore, August 2007
46 Ibid.
47 Ibid.
48 Anthony Spaeth, ‘Student Power’, Time, 16 December 1996
49 Irrawaddy, ‘“Fighting peacock” on the streets again’, January 1997 – http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=183
50 Dr Michael Aris, ‘A Tribute for James Leander Nichols’, 23 July 1996
51 Independent, Obituaries, Leo Nichols, 26 June 1996
52 Asiaweek, ‘On the Streets’, 20 December 1996
53 Statement released by Dr Michael Aris, Oxford, 30 November 1992
54 Asiaweek, ‘A Careful Hero: Suu Kyi Confronts Some Tough Choices’, 4 August 1995
55 Preliminary Report of the Ad Hoc Commission on Depayin Massacre (Burma), 4 July 2003
56 See www.burmapartnership.org
Chapter 3: A Campaign of Brutality in the East
1 Christian Solidarity Worldwide, ‘Burma: Visit to the Thailand–Burma Border’, February 2010
2 Smith, 44
3 Christian Solidarity Worldwide, ‘Burma: Visit to the Thailand–Burma Border’, February 2010
4 Smith, 72
5 South, 30
6 Ibid., 57
7 Ibid., 58
8 Christian Solidarity Worldwide, ‘Burma: Visit to the Karen and Mon Peoples on the Thailand–Burma Border’, 27 February–8 March 2007
9 Christian Solidarity Worldwide, ‘Burma: Visit to the Thai–Burmese Border’, November 2006
10 Christian Solidarity Worldwide, ‘Seven Year-Old Karen Girl Raped and Killed by Burma Army Soldier’, 5 January 2009
11 Karen Human Rights Group
12 Free Burma Rangers reports, 2006
13 Free Burma Rangers, ‘Over 2,100 displaced as Burma Army mortars villages and burns homes in new attacks’, 8 March 2008
14 Christian Solidarity Worldwide, ‘Burma: Visit to the Thai-Burmese Border’, 19–26 April 2004
15 Ibid.
16 Bernice Koehler Johnson, The Shan: Refugees without a Camp, Trinity Matrix, 2009, 31
17 Shan Human Rights Foundation, ‘Dispossessed: A report on forced relocation and extrajudicial killings in Shan State’, April 1998
18 Shan Women’s Action Network, ‘License to Rape’, 2001
19 Women’s League of Burma, ‘System of Impunity’, 2004
20 Chris Beyrer and Richard Sollom, ‘Burma’s Rising Toll: The Junta Widens a War on Ethnic Groups’, Washington Post, 3 September 2009
21 Shan Human Rights Foundation, ‘10,000 Shans Uprooted, 500 houses burned in Burmese regime’s latest scorched earth campaign’, 13 August 2009
22 Shan Women’s Action Network, ‘Forbidden Glimpses of Shan State: A Brief Alternative Guide’, 2009
23 Ibid.
24 Christian Solidarity Worldwide, ‘Burma: Visit to the Thai-Burma Border’, November 2002
25 Democratic Voice of Burma, ‘Burma conflict due to “misunderstanding”: Thein Sein’, 2 March 2012 – http://www.dvb.no/news/burma-conflict-due-to-misunderstanding-thein-sein/20528
26 Smith, Burma: Insurgency and the Politics of Ethnicity, 32
27 Christian Solidarity Worldwide, ‘Visit to the Karen and Mon Peoples on the Thailand–Burma Border’, February 2007
28 Zoya Phan, Little Daughter: A Memoir of Survival in Burma and the West, Simon and Schuster, 2009, 226
29 Ibid., 232
30 Ibid., 236
31 Ibid., 252
32 Ibid., 263
33 Ibid., 287
34 Andrew Marshall, ‘Dr Cynthia Maung – Healer of Souls’, Time, 28 April 2003
35 Benedict Rogers, A Land Without Evil: Stopping the Genocide of Burma’s Karen People, Monarch Books, 2004, 184
36 Free Burma Rangers, ‘Torture, Capture, Uprooted Villages and Child Soldiers: Life in Northwestern Karen State’, 16 May 2009
37 Free Burma Rangers, April–May 2005 report
38 Free Burma Rangers, ‘Eliya Samson: First Ranger’, 26 September 2008
39 Humanitarian Aid Relief Trust (HART), Visit to HART Partners in and from Eastern Burma, 25–31 October 2009
40 Thein Sein, ‘Inaugural address to the Pyidaungsu Hluttaw’, Naypyidaw, 30 March 2011
41 Thailand Burma Border Consortium, ‘Protracted Displacement and Chronic Poverty in Eastern Burma’, 2010, 3
42 Amnesty International, ‘Crimes against humanity in eastern Myanmar’, 5 June 2008
Chapter 4: A Silent Cry in the North
1 Project Maje, ‘The North War, Part II: Kachin Conflict Continues’, December 2011 – www.projectmaje.org
2 South, 18
3 Ibid., 18
4 UN Development Programme, ‘UN Myanmar Vulnerability Mapping and Monit
oring System’, June 2005, as quoted in South, 151
5 ‘In His Own Words: Colonel Chit Myaing’, Burma Debate, July/August 1997
6 Ibid., 152
7 Ibid., 152
8 Ibid., 152
9 Christian Solidarity Worldwide, ‘Burma: Visit to the Thailand–Burma Border and Malaysia’, February 2008
10 South, 154
11 Transnational Institute, ‘Neither War Nor Peace: The Future of the Ceasefire Agreements in Burma’, July 2009, 14
12 Ibid., 14
13 South, 155
14 Transnational Institute, 17
15 Ibid., 14
16 Christian Solidarity Worldwide, ‘Burma: Visit to Kachin State’, May 2009
17 Christian Solidarity Worldwide, ‘Kachin School Girl Gang-Raped, Mutilated and Killed by Burma Army Soldiers’, 15 August 2008
18 South, 153
19 Transnational Institute, 23
Burma- a Nation at the Crossroads Page 31