2012 Democracy Award Honorees, September 20, 2012

2012 Democracy Award Honorees

http://www.ned.org/events/democracy-award/2012-democracy-award

Min Ko Naing is a founding member of the 88 Generation Students Group, which played a key role in the 2007 Saffron Revolution. He rose to international prominence for his leadership role in the pro-democracy protests in 1988 (popularly known as the “8888 Uprising”), during which time he was chairman of the All Burma Federation of Student Unions (ABFSU). The New York Times has described him as Burma’s “most influential opposition figure after Daw Aung San Suu Kyi.” Both the 8888 Uprising and 2007 Saffron Revolution were violently repressed by the military regime. As a key leader of both, Min Ko Naing spent the majority of the last 20 years in prison, much of it in solitary confinement. He was released on January 13, 2012, in a mass presidential amnesty. During the past two decades, Min Ko Naing has received numerous international awards for his courage, conviction, and dedication to nonviolence and democracy. These awards include the 2009 Gwangju Prize for Human Rights; the 2005 Civic Courage Prize, which he shared with Anna Politkovskaya and Munir Said Thailib; the 2000 Homo Homini Award from People in Need; and the 1999 John Humphrey Freedom Award, which he shared with Dr. Cynthia Maung.

Hkun Htun Oo is a leading politician from Burma’s Shan State and Chairman of the Shan Nationalities League for Democracy (SNLD) party. Following the 8888 Uprising, he ran in the 1990 parliamentary elections as the head of the SNLD, which won 23 seats, the second most of any party after the National League for Democracy (NLD). After the military government annulled the results, Hkun Htun Oo continued to work for democratic change within the country, for which he was arrested in 2005 and given a 93-year prison term for treason, defamation, and inciting dissatisfaction toward the government. Amnesty International recognized him as a prisoner of conscience, and in December 2008, he was awarded honorary Italian citizenship by the mayor of Monza. In March 2011, the United Nationalities Alliance, a group representing several minorities in Burma, awarded him the Nationalities Hero prize for his “dedication and struggle for ethnic groups and national reconciliation.” He was released from prison in a presidential amnesty on January 13, 2012.

Kyaw Thu is a two-time Myanmar Academy Award winning film director and actor, as well as founder and president of the Free Funeral Service Society (FFSS), which, since 2001, has provided free funeral services to more than 110,000 people across Burma. In addition, FFSS operates a free clinic for the poor, supports scholarships, organizes vocational and computer trainings, and helps to meet the health needs of former political prisoners. A leading man in Burmese cinema in the 1980s and 1990s, Kyaw Thu gradually turned his attention to social work, and by serving as volunteer president of FFSS, became one of the most prominent members of Burma’s civil society. In 2007, he and his wife were arrested after publicly supporting the Saffron Revolution, after which he was banned from the film industry. After his release, Kyaw Thu and FFSS played a vital role in rescue and fundraising efforts in the aftermath of Cyclone Nargis, which devastated Burma’s Irrawaddy delta and cost over 130,000 lives in May 2008.

Dr. Cynthia Maung is an ethnic Karen medical doctor and founder of the Mae Tao Clinic in Mae Sot, Thailand on the Thai-Burmese border. She founded the clinic soon after fleeing to Thailand in the aftermath of the 8888 Uprising, where she works with a staff of over 700 people to provide medical services to refugees, migrant workers and orphans. The clinic receives 400–500 patients daily, treating such conditions as malaria, respiratory disease and diarrhea, as well as gunshot wounds and land mine injuries. Dr. Cynthia and the Mae Tao Clinic have received numerous international awards, including the Taiwan Foundation for Democracy’s Asia Democracy and Human Rights Award, the Ramon Magsaysay Award, the John Humphrey Freedom Award, the Jonathan Mann Health and Human Rights Award, Catalonia’s International Prize, which she won in conjunction with Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, and most recently, the Freedom to Create Leadership for Women Award.

Aung Din served over four years behind bars as a political prisoner in Burma after helping to organize the country’s nationwide pro-democracy uprising in 1988 as Vice-Chairperson of the All Burma Federation of Student Unions (ABFSU), the largest national student organization and outlawed by the regime. He also served as Vice-Chairman of Burma’s Youth Liberation Front (BYLF), and as Cabinet Secretary of the Parallel Government, which was founded by former Prime Minister U Nu during the peak of the 1988 pro-democracy uprising. Amnesty International recognized him as a prisoner of conscience in 1989, and its chapters worldwide campaigned for his release. In 2003, he co-founded the Washington, DC-based U.S. Campaign for Burma (USCB), an umbrella group of Burmese dissidents in exile and American activists, where he now serves as executive director.

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Was Burma's 1988 Uprising Worth It?

By Philippa Fogarty
BBC News
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/7543347.stm

On 8 August 1988 cities across Burma were packed with demonstrators.

Hundreds of thousands of people marched through the then capital, Rangoon, calling for a transition to democracy and an end to military rule. They were the largest mass protests in the country since independence in 1948 - and it looked for a while as though they might achieve results. But six weeks later, at least 3,000 protesters were dead, thousands more were jailed and the military was firmly back in control.

Aung Din, then an engineering student at Rangoon Institute of Technology, was involved from the start. Like many, he was angry about tight military control, economic crisis and nonsensical currency reforms that had wiped out most people's savings.

On 13 March 1988, he took part in a protest at his university. Riot police reacted with force. Three students were shot, and one, Phone Maw, was killed. Three days later, another student demonstration was brutally crushed. Universities were shut, but the students were angry and determined. When they reopened in June, rallies gathered pace.

"We had to hide, but we had lots of meetings," said Aung Din. "We felt that there was no justice or freedom. So we decided we had to bring about an uprising that would end single-party rule." A massive rally was planned - and 8/8/88, with its instantly recognizable numbers, emerged as the date to hold it.

"It was amazing," said Aung Din. "Columns of people came from all over, and where we met in downtown Rangoon, there were about 500,000 people. At the same time, in other townships, everywhere people were marching for the same things, for democracy and human rights."

Another of the marchers was 14-year-old Min Zin. His older brother and sister had been arrested after the March protests, his brother tortured. "I was too young - I didn't know much about democracy and human rights. I only knew that this was really wrong, so it was really a spontaneous response," he said.

He helped organize a high school students' union and produced pamphlets calling for an uprising. "We were so confident when we saw the people really took to the streets and joined the demonstration. It was quite wonderful," he said.

Crackdown

Then it turned bloody. Near midnight, troops opened fire on protesters at City Hall. The next day, they targeted crowds at Shwedagon Pagoda, where Min Zin was.

"It was the first time I saw my friends and colleagues - including some even younger than me - get killed in front of my eyes."

Hundreds of people are thought to have died - but protests continued. Civil servants and monks joined the demonstrators as the government floundered. Then the movement found its public face in Aung San Suu Kyi.

On 26 August, the daughter of Burma's independence leader stood outside Shwedagon Pagoda and addressed a huge crowd on the need for democracy.

At that stage, said Aung Din, victory appeared possible. But it was not to be. On 18 September the army struck back. Soldiers fired repeatedly at crowds. Hundreds more were killed. Some fled, others were arrested. So began a crackdown on the protesters. Even as the military promised democratic elections, its agents hunted opponents.

They came for Min Zin, but he was not there, so they arrested his father. Min Zin went into hiding for nine years.

Aung Din, by then vice-chairman of the All Burma Federation of Student Unions, was working to organize parties into a united front for the polls. He was arrested on 23 April 1989, tortured and jailed for four years and three months. While he was in prison, the Aung San Suu Kyi-led National League for Democracy won a landslide victory in the elections - but the military ignored the result.

'Fulfill my promise'

Twenty years on, what has changed? The military remains firmly in control. Troops violently crushed anti-government protests in September 2007, with the loss of dozens of lives. Most of those who led the 1988 protests are either in overseas exile, in hiding or in prison.

Aung San Suu Kyi remains under house arrest, while the military has just forced through a new constitution that further cements its grip on power. Despite Burma's natural resources, millions live in abject poverty. But, said Aung Din, there is still reason to hope. He is still involved in the pro-democracy movement, as executive director of the US Campaign for Burma.

"Many thought that what happened in 1988 would stay in 1988. Nobody expected that it would continue, but it has survived to this day." He was encouraged at the sight of young people on the streets in September last year. "We need a new generation of leaders to hold our flag - and 2007 created that generation of students inside the country. They are smarter than us and they are growing now."

Min Zin had to leave Burma in 1997. He was an activist and journalist for several years, but is now going to university in the US. He wants the new generation of activists to learn from the past. "You can expect spontaneous demonstrations against the military - but the problem is that you have to be organized. My concern is whether it can lead to a genuine political change."

Part of the reason the 8/8/88 uprising failed was because the opposition had no "end-game" strategy, he said. They lacked unity and so failed to seize their opportunity. He worries that even today; many of the activists "do not try to translate principle into victory".

Sometimes, Min Zin says, he feels frustrated. "I spent all of my adult life in the democracy movement and I haven't seen any concrete results towards a transition to democracy." But a specific memory keeps him going. On 8/8/88, despite their poverty, people gave rice to the demonstrators so that they could keep on marching.

"When we collected the rice bags, we always promised them: 'You will get democracy one day'. So I never met my promise." "I need to fulfill my promise that I gave to my people."

Torture Survivor Campaigns for Freedom in Burma

http://www.america.gov/st/hr-english/2008/July/20080725152150ajesrom0.588299.html
25 July 2008

Torture Survivor Campaigns for Freedom in Burma

Political activist Aung Din speaks out for prisoners of conscience

Burmese political activist Aung Din

By Jane Morse
Staff Writer

Washington -- Aung Din survived the torture and years of imprisonment he received in Burma as punishment for his political views. On July 24 he spoke at the United Nations in New York City on behalf of political prisoners in his homeland and elsewhere in the world.

He was one of several political activists at a special panel discussion designed to underscore international promises made in the Declaration of Prisoners of Conscience issued in June. The declaration, sponsored by the United States and 63 other U.N. member states, calls for a high-priority global commitment to freeing prisoners of conscience.

The panel discussion was moderated by Ambassador T. Vance McMahan, U.S. representative to the U.N. Economic and Social Council, who told the audience, “Persecution of human rights defenders occurs in many parts of the globe and requires the urgent attention of the international community as a whole.”

At the panel discussion, Aung Din said the Burmese regime is holding about 2,000 political detainees, including Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi. He described the abuse he suffered for his dedication to freedom for his countrymen.

Aung Din spent more than four years in prison -- sometimes in solitary confinement, naked, in total darkness -- after organizing and leading Burma’s nationwide pro-democracy uprising in August 1988 as vice chairman of the All Burma Federation of Student Unions. ABFSU, the largest student organization in Burma, is outlawed by the ruling military junta.

He endured physical and psychological torture in the interrogation chambers run by military intelligence and in prisons -- two years in the notorious Insein Prison in Rangoon, and another two years in Thayet Prison in central Burma.

In 1989, Amnesty International designated him a “Prisoner of Conscience,” and its chapters worldwide campaigned for his release. He was released in July 1993 and fled Burma in 1995. After living in Singapore, where he received a graduate diploma in business administration, and Thailand, he came to the United States in 2001. Since his arrival in the United States, Aung Din has earned a master’s degree from American University’s School of International Service.

In 2003, Aung Din co-founded the Washington-based U.S. Campaign for Burma, an umbrella group of Burmese dissidents in exile and American activists. He is also country representative of the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners-Burma based at the Thai-Burma border.

He has been quoted in hundreds of articles, testified before the U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee and the Congressional Human Rights Caucus, and traveled on speaking tours across the United States.

At the July 24 U.N. panel discussion, Aung Din said the Burmese regime continues to abuse prisoners horribly, many of them just ordinary people. “They are not criminals,” he said. “Actually, they are the future of our country. Their lives should be used for building a better nation.”

In a statement issued June 10, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said, "The United States believes that the ongoing detention of political prisoners, including National League for Democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, and the conditions under which they are held, is appalling. … The United States continues to urge the Burmese regime to release all political prisoners, including Aung San Suu Kyi, and to begin a genuine dialogue with democratic and ethnic minority leaders on a transition to democracy."