U.S. Senate
Washington, D.C. 20510-6225
HEARING ON
“A REVIEW OF THE DEVELOPMENTS OF DEMOCRACY IN BURMA ”
SUBCOMMITTEE ON EAST ASIAN AND THE PACIFIC AFFAIRS
SENATE FOREIGN RELATIONS COMMITTEE
WASHINGTON, D.C
JUNE 18, 2003
TESTIMONY BY U AUNG DIN
DIRECTOR, FREE BURMA COALITION
1101 Pennsylvania Ave, SE # 204
Washington, D.C 20003
INTRODUCTION
Mr. Chairman,
Thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak on behalf of 50 million Burmese who are locked in a battle with an illegitimate military regime to bring peace, democracy and human rights to our country. My name is Aung Din, and as you mentioned I serve as the director of policy for the Free Burma Coalition, an organization based in the United States with national and international chapters.
I'd like to thank you, Senators McConnell and Feinstein, and the members of the United States Senate for the overwhelming bipartisan vote to approve the Burma Freedom and Democracy Act last week. By supporting this legislation, you sent a clear message to the people of Burma that you support our struggle for freedom. I urge the House to act on this legislation soon.
Since you have already heard much about the events surrounding May 30th, 2003, I want to tell you about myself and discuss the many different ways that the people of Burma are working to get rid of our country's dictatorship. I know that Aung San Suu Kyi is the most recognized person from Burma, but it is important for the Committee to know that there are thousands of others in Burma who are committed to nonviolence and working for the removal of the regime and the institution of a democratic Burma.
In 1988, I was a student at the Rangoon Institute of Technology when I and many of my fellow students helped to organize a nationwide demonstration that almost overthrew the military government. We marched proudly in front of the American Embassy and waved our banners, because we knew that Americans believe in freedom and democracy. We avoided the Soviet embassy for the same reason.
Tragically, as millions of people marched on the streets, the military regime opened fire on us. Up to 10,000 people were murdered in a matter of weeks, including students, women and infant children. Those who survived were jailed and suffered daily torture sessions.
Mr. Chairman, this was one year before the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Unfortunately, because the military refused to let any international news media inside the country, no one knew what happened to us. After seeing my colleagues gunned down on the streets, I was very scared, but I knew I couldn't give up. I continued to organize
demonstrations and protests, and eventually, I was captured by the regime.
When they arrested me, they handcuffed me, threw a hood over my head, and pulled me off the bus I was riding. I was taken to a military interrogation center, where I was held with no food, no drink, no toilet, and no sleep for one week. My hood was never removed. Successive shifts of interrogation officers beat, kicked, and hit me. When I asked for water, they laughed at me. When I asked to use the bathroom, they beat me even more. Many times I almost passed out, but they poured cold water onto my head to wake me up so my beatings could continue.
A month later, I was put in solitary confinement, where I stayed for over a year. In Burma, solitary confinement means no human contact. I was sent to military court and given a sentence of four years in prison. My trial took only fifteen minutes, and I had no lawyer. I spent the next four years of my life behind bars.
If there is a hell on earth, it must be Burma’s Insein prison where I was jailed. For political prisoners such as myself each day centered on interrogations, beatings, and mental torture. When the guards noticed I had written a calendar on my wall with a small piece of brick, I was thrown in pitch-black solitary confinement. When I forgot to stand at attention, I was forced to crawl on sharp, pointed stones for 100 yards while the prison guards beat me with sticks and belts. Many of my fellow prisoners were tortured even more. They were tortured for dropping a cup of water. They were tortured for teaching English--they were tortured for anything. Often, when I tried to sleep, I could hear the screams of those being tortured. Those screams haunt me to this day. They are the voices of my friends, many of who were killed by the violence inflicted upon their bodies. It is for them that I have dedicated my life to freeing my country from the evil darkness that is the ruling military junta.
Our families did not escape either. My brother was also arrested for his participation in the freedom struggle. Many parents and families were forced out of their jobs by the regime. The regime through the military intelligence (MI) apparatus, conducts a scorched earth campaign against anyone associated with the democracy movement.
OTHER POLITICAL PRISONERS
I want to tell you about the other brave people of Burma. There are over 1,600 men and women political prisoners in Burma and many have been behind bars for over a decade. We talk so many times about numbers that it can be easy to forget their names and their stories.
My friend Min Ko Naing has been in prison since 1989. For the Burmese people, Aung San Suu Kyi is like George Washington. Min Ko Naing is like Sam Adams—he is a true hero. Just as much as Aung San Suu Kyi, he was the main leader of our revolution. He spoke at rallies across the country and called on the people to believe in freedom. I think that he understood freedom and democracy at its roots, far before many of the rest of us.
We were both arrested almost at the same time. He was also severely tortured. Unlike me, however, he has been held in solitary confinement for 14 years. It might be that the military regime will never release him.
In 1994, U.S. Congressman Bill Richardson met Min Ko Naing in prison. He told the Congressman to continue the struggle for freedom and democracy. The military
punished Min Ko Naing by transferring him 500 miles away from his family. Now, his family can only visit him once a year. He has never been permitted to leave his 8 x 10 foot cell for more than 15 minutes per day.
The regime has offered to release Min Ko Naing if he will sign a document forswearing any political activity and condemning the democracy movement. He has refused. In the face of such brutal tyranny, he continues to fight back against the regime. His courage should inspire us.
Mr. Chairman,
I would now to like to discuss the many different ways people are resisting the military regime in Burma. Aung San Suu Kyi is one person in a democracy movement that is broad and deep. There are hundreds of activists that are jailed and killed each year who never receive any attention. Most of my people struggle, suffer, and die without a word being raised by the international community.
INFORMATION
One way that we are working to bring change to Burma is through information. The National Endowment for Democracy gives money to organizations along the Thailand-Burma border that help to get information inside the country, including this newspaper, the New Era Journal. Every month, we distribute thousands of copies inside Burma through a courier network. Keep in mind that possession of this newspaper is an automatic seven-year jail sentence.
We are also very grateful for services from the Voice of America and Radio Free Asia. Even though many people have been sentenced to long prison terms for listening to the radio, the people of Burma listen to these radio programs almost every night in order to find out what's going on in the world and in our own country.
PROTESTS AND POLITICAL DEFIANCE
My people also continue to organize protests around the country. Last August, two of my colleagues were arrested for organizing a protest in downtown Rangoon. In September 30 more people were arrested for protesting. In November, a man was arrested for making an NLD symbol, and in January, two Buddhist nuns were arrested for organizing a demonstration. In February, one dozen people were arrested for planning a demonstration, and in May another man was arrested.
I know that it doesn't make it in the news very often, but not a month goes by that the people of Burma aren't trying to organize a nationwide uprising. There are also many actions taking place in a coordinated manner that are directed at fostering support for the democracy movement within Burma’s armed forces. The Burma military is a force that is kept together through fear and terror. In the 1990 elections, voting precincts in major military areas delivered overwhelming majorities for the NLD. It is a military that has no ideological commitment to the ruling regime. The outreach effort is aimed at convincing military leaders that the future of the country lies with the democracy movement, and not with the regime.
Other actions by underground groups inside the country allow freedom activists to travel and conduct organization work with key groups such as monks and rice farmers. Aung San Suu Kyi’s speeches are copied and distributed by the thousands on audiotape in Burma. I would be happy to talk about these efforts with you in a more private setting. I also want to point out that the Open Society Institute, Norweigen-Burma Committee, and several other organizations—some government sponsored—are assisting our movement.
ATTENDING PRO-DEMOCRACY SPEECHES
The Burmese people are also defying the military regime by attending speeches of Aung San Suu Kyi. These are really more than just speeches--they are democracy rallies.
In December, 20,000 people came to see her speak in Arakan state. In March, 30,000 people came to watch her speak in Chin State. And on this latest trip, tens of thousands of Burmese people risked their lives and their livelihoods to participate. Even when the regime has threatened them with weapons, fire engines and guns, they refused to turn back.
RECOMMENDATIONS
I would like to close my testimony by making a few recommendations for future policy on Burma. First and foremost, we must make it clear that, as Senator McConnell has said, we need REGIME CHANGE in Burma. The United Nations has attempted to foster a dialogue that can lead to a political transition, and events have shown this to be a failure. Sanctions will serve to cut the regime’s access to hard currency that it uses to finance its instruments of repression. We must now work on empowering activists inside the country to allow them to bring maximum internal pressure against the regime. Either way, they must be removed. The United States is in a unique position to help bring about change in the world because Americans believe in freedom and democracy.
In order to accomplish regime change, we must do the following things:
Increase resources to the struggle inside
We need increased resources to fund the struggle inside Burma. Sanctions will help us very much, but they should be seen as a first step. The people of Burma need to be given the tools to effect change, including money, communications equipment, food and humanitarian support to refugees internally displaced and in Thailand and India.
Pressure other countries to stop supporting Burma's regime with military sales and business investment
The United States needs to pressure ASEAN, Japan, and India to end their political support for the military regime. China will enjoy economic benefits from a free-market, politically stable Burma. Clearly, a democratic Burma will be better for the entire region.
Push the United Nations Security Council to act on Burma
The United Nations Security Council must act now on Burma. So far, the United Nations has been worthless in helping my country. The Burmese regime has played the United Nations like a dancing marionette. A Security Council resolution should seek to duplicate the actions contained in the Burma Freedom and Democracy Act.
If the Security Council refuses to act, the U.S. must help the Burmese people overthrow the illegitimate junta through the use of a nonviolent, mass mobilization campaign. I want to stress that we are not asking for military intervention, but we are asking for political and moral support directed to activists inside the country.
The regime has been given 2 and 1/2 years to bring change to Burma. Now, it is time to change the regime. We must bring unremitting pressure against these thugs. The same economic and political conditions that led to the 1988 uprising are still present in Burma. The regime is hated by the people and, if enough political space can open, I can envision another people power mobilization that can sweep this regime from Rangoon and condemn it to the ash heap of history.
We know that freedom isn't free. Its cost is measured in the bodies of dead democracy activists, broken families and years stolen from the lives of political prisoners. We are willing to pay the price and we do so every day. We want people around the world to know that we are freedom fighters, not victims.
Mr. Chairman, this regime will not last. I look forward to the day, when I am able to rejoin my family and friends in Burma, about telling them that during our darkest hour, when our fight was far from certain, when despair had almost overcome hope, that it was the people of the U.S. and their representatives sitting in this Congress, that lifted the torch of democracy and lit our path to freedom.
Thank You.
Aung Din
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