13^th ANNUAL 8/8/88 COMMEMORATIVE STATEMENT

SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA BURMESE ACTIVISTS GATHERING AT CANDLE LIGHT VIGIL TO REMEMBER THOUSANDS WHO WERE MASSACRED DURING THE 8/8/88 DEMOCRACY UPRISINGS IN BURMA

Today marks the 13^th year anniversary of the unforgettable 8/8/88 nation-wide uprisings in Burma. A peace-loving nation of 48 million people, unitedly and unarmed, demonstrated against the authoritarian military government. The Burmese people showed extraordinary courage and fought its heavily-armed military oppressors in an effort to restore freedom and democracy and allow a better standard of living. Thousands of demonstrators including students, teachers, office workers, laborers, housewives, religious, etc. were gunned down brutally. Hundreds of protestors were imprisoned and tortured. Many of the survivors fled to the Thai-Burma border, their aspirations intact and ever more solid.

Since a coup in March 1962, when General Ne Win seized power from a civilian government, Burma’s education system have been crippled, the economy paralyzed and the country impoverished to the poorest nation. The military dictators have deprived its citizens of every basic human rights/freedom. The military intelligence has ceaselessly harassed those who express dissent to their political views. Human rights violations in the context of the military government’s war against the ethnic minorities have long surpassed the level of sufferance. The regime interrogates, intimidates, threatens, arrests, detains, physically abuses, denies adequate medical care and treatment on the sick and suffering political prisoners and continually denies its citizens of their right to fair trial.

Throughout all difficult times, Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi, the opposition leader of NLD (National League for Democracy) remains the symbol of struggle between the democratic forces and the repressive military regime. Aung San Suu Kyi’s party that won 82% of the seats in a landslide victory in the 1990 nation-wide elections has been denied the transfer of ruling power by the illegal military regime.

Facilitated by UN envoy Razali Ismail, secret negotiations began October 2000 between Aung San Suu Kyi and the military regime. Although encouraged by the outside world to build momentum to achieve further progress in their dialogue process, no hint of the talks has appeared in the official Burmese media. So far, the regime has released about 150 political prisoners, but as many as 2000, possibly many more, remain in jail, including at least 20 Members of Parliament elected in the opposition’s massive 1990 victory.

What do we want ????????

1. We call upon the international community to maintain effective political, diplomatic and economic pressures on the military regime until full respect for human rights is restored in Burma

2. We call for the immediate and unconditional release of all political prisoners prior to continuance of the dialogue process between Aung San Suu Kyi and the regime

3. We call for the immediate and unconditional release of all Members of Parliament elected with people’s power during the 1990 elections

San Francisco Bay Area 13^th annual 8/8/88 Joint Action Committee