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9999 seminar at Fort Wayne, Indiana



Exiled Burmese dissident brings message of country's woes to city

By Mike Gruss    The Journal Gazette

Htun Aung Gyaw spent six years in a Burmese prison, eight months of it in 
solitary confinement, for leading a student protest in the small Asian 
country near Thailand.He paced 3,600 steps and exercised by doing three sets 
of 30 pushups each day while incarcerated. He held his nose six days a week 
while slugging down the vegetable soup that passed as a meal. Sometimes 
worms wiggled in the broth.As a political prisoner, he was kicked and beaten 
by hardened criminals. He slept in quarters with more than 200 people, some 
with skin disease and scabies."It's like a living hell," he said Sunday in 
sandals and a purple longyi, similar to a patterned skirt.Gyaw was in Fort 
Wayne during the weekend for the Freedom for Burma seminar, just days before 
the people of his country actively renew their fight against the military 
dictatorship.At the Walb Union Ballroom at Indiana-Purdue, Fort Wayne on 
Sunday, more than 100 people including Burmese refugees and leaders met to 
discuss the country's next push for freedom, expected to come Thursday. 
Maung Maung Win, the seminar's director, said more than 500 Burmese live in 
Allen County.Burma's last major rebellion to overcome military dictatorship 
began on Aug. 8, 1988 before it was crushed by the government.Sunday's 
speakers urged legal action against the Burmese military, unseating the 
government in the United Nations and pledging support to Daw Aung San Suu 
Kyi, a popular party leader and a member of Burma's most beloved family. Her 
father, who founded the Burmese army and helped negotiate for its 
independence from Britain, was assassinated in 1948.In 1962, Burma's 
parliamentary democracy was overthrown by a military dictatorship. After the 
1988 protests, Kyi won a general election in May, 1990 but the military did 
not recognize her victory. Protests are scheduled for Thursday in Australia, 
New York, Canada, Germany and England.Gyaw, a publishing assistant at 
Cornell University and president of the Civil Society for Burma, was among 
those who compared the two uprisings and urged student involvement. He also 
visited many of his former comrades, some of whom wore political buttons 
campaigning for freedom.In 1974, Gyaw spoke in front of more than 100,000 
students to protest the Burmese government, which would not hold funeral 
services for popular U.N. Secretary-General Thant who died in New York City. 
Thant was Burmese.Gyaw spent the next six years in prison until he was 
granted amnesty in 1980.Nevertheless, Gyaw remained active in politics and 
in 1984 he was sentenced to death again after a protest in the 
Thailand-Burma free zone.He was granted political asylum in the United 
States in 1992 and now travels the country, speaking to middle school, high 
school, and college students about the military dictatorship.He is still 
nervous about what will happen Thursday."We are very excited and very 
worried about the people," he said."We are free here, and they are under the 
military boots. We don't want anybody to be killed."His message was shared 
by many of the afternoon's other speakers.David Holton, a professor from 
Fort Wayne, spoke on including and educating Americans about the Burmese 
effort.He said many are unaware that Burmese schools have been closed since 
1996 to hinder democratic movements and that criticism of the government can 
land activists in jail.Tin Maung Thaw urged letter-writing campaigns and 
protests at companies such as Suzuki, which produces cars and motorcycles in 
Burma."This is the right thing to do," he said."It is an uphill battle. I 
know sometimes it feels like we are trying to beat an unbeatable monster. 
But if we don't do it, who will."PUBLISHED: MONDAY, SEPT. 6, 1999



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