‘It wasn’t a perfect democracy - but they got a taste of democracy’ – Irishwoman in Myanmar on why protests will continue

Young people in Myanmar have experienced democracy before and will continue to risk their lives for it as a result, an Irishwoman living in the country has said.

The woman, who kept her identity anonymous to protect herself, described the current situation in Myanmar’s largest city, Yangon, which has experienced large levels of unrest since February.

Since the military generals ousted and detained civilian leader Aung San Suu Kyi, there have been mass protests demanding a return to democracy.

“This weekend we had the annual armed forces day, and normally that would be a large parade kind of showing the might of the Myanmar military, usually held in the capital Naypyitaw,” the woman told RTÉ Radio One’s Morning Ireland.

“It also brought a lot of people out on the street to protest on the Saturday, and there was a huge amount of violence and crackdown on those protests.

“There was the highest number of deaths yet reported on Saturday, and people as young as five years old were shot dead.”

She added that many of the young people will continue to protest despite how dangerous it could be.

“The young people continue to go out because they have grown up hearing the stories from their parents about what happened in the previous revolutions, and what life was like under the previous dictatorship,” she said.

“They’ve had about five years under the democratic government - and it wasn’t a perfect democracy - but they got a taste of democracy. And that combination is quite dangerous to the military because the young people know what they can have and they are sure that they don’t want to go back to what their parents had.”

While she said that there are some members of the military who have defected and switched sides, it’s a fairly uncommon phenomenon.

“There have been small numbers of both police and very few number of soldiers who have defied their orders,” she said.

“The thing is that those soldiers tend to be based from the more rural parts of the country, the police as well.

“And while it can be quite encouraging for the movement it’s quite ineffective. The most brutal battalions are here in Yangon and they’re not defecting.

“You have to remember there’s a system of fear and a sort of brainwashing that goes on in the military and to defy orders really is to sign up to an awful future.”

The woman spoke after Saturday became the worst day of violence since the military takeover on February 1.

In a rare joint statement, the defence chiefs of Britain, the US, Australia and other countries in Asia-Pacific and Europe urged Myanmar’s armed forces and security services to stop using violence against unarmed civilians.

“A professional military follows international standards for conduct and is responsible for protecting – not harming – the people it serves,” the statement read.

It was issued by the defence chiefs of Australia, Canada, Denmark, Germany, Greece, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, New Zealand, South Korea, the UK and US.

The condemnation came as the death toll in the wake of the military coup rose to at least 423, and as the Myanmar embassy in London revealed that it had met the son of the deposed leader, Aung San Suu Kyi, who is demanding to speak to his detained mother.

In recent weeks, security forces have been using intensifying violence to quell massive public opposition to the military takeover.

The largest number of killings so far took place on Saturday, when indiscriminate violence by armed forces included a one-year-old baby being hit in the eye with a rubber bullet, the deaths of a five-year-boy and at least three teenagers, and the shooting and burning alive of a father of four.

Troops opened fire in an area of Mandalay, wounding Aye Ko (40) in the chest, and then put him on a stack of burning tyres, the Myanmar Now news portal reported.

Saturday’s 114 deaths across 40 cities and towns drew swift international condemnation. Antony Blinken, US secretary of state, said the bloodshed showed that “the junta will sacrifice the lives of the people to serve the few”. He added: “The courageous people [of Myanmar] reject the military’s reign of terror.”

But Phil Robertson, the deputy Asia director of Human Rights Watch, said the international community needed to do more than issue “toughly worded statements”.

“Myanmar’s security forces need to be urgently stripped of the weapons, money and resources that enable them to operate, through a global arms embargo and targeted economic sanctions enforced by a UN Security Council mandate,” he said.

Defiant protesters were back on the streets yesterday, with demonstrations held in the two biggest cities of Yangon and Mandalay, some of which were again met by force.

Many thousands have been calling for the junta to step down and for the release of Ms Suu Kyi, who has not been seen since the morning of the coup eight weeks ago.

Additional reporting: The Telegraph 

Irish Independent