Letters from Burma by Aung San Suu Kyi.

A Special Introduction

Four leading members of the Executive Committee of the National League for Democracy have already been introduced to readers of "Letter from Burma." This week I would like to make a special introduction, to make known to the people of Japan the only member of the original Executive Committee of the NLD who still remains in prison today: U Win Tin.

Unlike U Aung Shwe, U Kyi Maung, U Tin U and U Lwin, U Win Tin, born in 1930, was never a member of the armed forces. The world of letters was his domain. Even before graduation from university he had begun to work for the Burma Translation Society in the capacity of assistant editor. In 1954 he became advisory editor to a Dutch newspaper company. This was the beginning of a long career in journalism which culminated in his appointment of the Hanthawaddy, one of the leading dailies of Burma. The years during which U Win Tin was chief editor of the Hanthawaddy were years which saw the consolidation of the Burmese Way to Socialism. Progressive restrictions were placed on free speech and expression but a handful of writers and journalists quietly persisted in preserving their right to intellectual freedom. In 1978, a paper critical of the Burmese Way to Socialism was read at the "Saturday Reading Circle"of which U Win Tin was a leading member. As a consequence he was dismissed from his job and the Hanthawaddy newspaper was shut down by the authorities. For the next decade U Win Tin earned his living as a freelance writer and translator.

It was only natural that those who believed in intellectual freedom and justices should have been at the vanguard of the democracy movement which began in 1988. From the beginning U Win Tin played an active role in the Writers' Union that emerged during the early days of the movement. In September 1988, he became one of the secretaries of the executive committee of the NLD.

His undoubted ability and his strength of purpose made U Win Tin a prime target of those who opposed the democratic cause and in June 1989 he became one of the very first leaders of the NLD to be arrested. The charge against him involved an unproven telephone conversation with the father of an individual who had been declared a fugitive from the law. Telephone conversations are, in any case, inadmissable as evidence under the law but the law offers scant protection for those who challenge military rule in Burma. Immediately after his arrest, U Win Tin was kept without food and interrogated about his activities in the democracy movement. It appeared that the interrogators wished to force him to admit that he was my adviser on political tactics, in other words, that he was my puppet master. A man of courage and integrity, U Win Tin would not be intimidated into making false confessions. In October 1989, he was sentenced to three years imprisonment. In June 1992, a few month before his prison terms was due to expire, he was submitted to another farcical trial and sentenced to an additional 11 years in jail.

U Win Tin is little given to talking about himself. As secretary and general secretary he and I worked together on an almost daily basis from the time the NLD was founded but it was several months before I discovered, quite by chance, that he was a bachelor who lived alone and managed his own household chores. Soon after he was sentenced in 1989, the lease on the state-owned flat where he had been living for many years was canceled and friends had to move his possessions out of the apartment. U Win Tin's whole demeanor conveys such an impression of firmness, few people are aware that he suffers from a heart condition that requires constant medication. The long period spent in prison where medical care is inadequate and living conditions abysmal have aggravated his health problems. When U.S. Congressman Bill Richardson saw him in February 1994 U Win Tin was wearing a neck support: spondylosis has been added to his afflictions. He was also in need of dental treatment. But his mind was as clear as ever and his spirit upright and unwavering. In the full knowledge that his every world would be reported to the authorities, he commented on the National Convention that had been arranged by the SLORC with his customary incisiveness and sent me a message of strong, unequivocal support.

Now U Win Tin is facing the serious possibility of a third sentence superimposed on the two that have already been slapped on him. Since November 1995, he and 27 other political prisoners have been charged with breaking prison regulations and their trials are taking place within the jail precincts. The families of the defendants have asked senior members of the government, the Chief Justice and the Attorney General to be allowed to provide the legal assistance entitled under the law. An answer is not yet forthcoming.