August 28, 2002

Mai Aik Pan, 40, died in Moulmein General Hospital on July 31, 2002.
According to prison authorities, he died of dropsy. Dropsy is a bacterial
infection often caused by kidney or heart disease. Dropsy is considered
relatively easy to treat with simple penicillin or tetracycline. However,
his family members are suspicious of his sudden death. After visiting him
in June, they say he did not mention any health problems, and appeared to
be in good health. According to other inmates at Moulmein Prison, he was
not transferred to the hospital until the day before he died.
Mai Aik Pan was joint-secretary of the Palaung State Liberation Front
(PSLF), which is based along the Thai-Burma border. He also served as an
advisor to the Palaung Youth Network Group (PYNG). Burmese military
intelligence officers in Myawaddy, Burma arrested him near the Thai-Burma
Friendship Bridge on October 1, 2001. He was later given a seven-year
prison sentence under section 17/1 for unlawful association. He was then
placed in Moulmein Prison in Burma's Mon State.
Mai Aik Pan's death must be seen as an obvious result of inadequate
medication and late hospitalization. Ko Tate, secretary of AAPP, says: "The
death of Aik Pan has shown the appalling health care conditions in
[Burma's] prisons. The prison system requires that military intelligence
must approve the transfer of a political prisoner before they can be sent
to the hospital. Recently, there have been an increasing number of deaths
in prison. The international community should pay more attention to the
prison situations inside Burma, and put more pressure on the Burmese junta
to conform to international human rights norms and the relevant UN
conventions."
According to AAPP's research, 71 political prisonersincluding Mai Aik
Panhave died in Burma's prisons since 1988, after the current regime seized
the power.
AAPP